UW Rally Falls Short in 73-64 defeat vs. Stanford

The Washington Huskies couldn’t keep up their home winning streak as they fell to Stanford by a score of 73-64 to drop to 13-5 (3-2). A late comeback attempt got UW close but ultimately the Dawgs just couldn’t put the ball in the basket frequently enough. The salt in the wound is that Stanford was led by former-double UW commit/de-commit Daejon Davis who finished with 16 points, 10 rebounds, and 5 assists (plus 7 turnovers).

The Huskies started out this game extremely flat. Stanford got up to an early 15-5 lead as both teams were sloppy but the Cardinal were making shots when they held onto the ball. Daejon Davis in his return to Seattle alternated making acrobatic layups with terrible turnovers pushing it in transition. It didn’t help when Noah Dickerson picked up his 2nd foul trying to get position inside on offense 6 minutes into the half.

The Huskies started out 2/11 from the field before eventually finding their stride. That only occurred once Reid Travis picked up his second foul and left the game. He had 9 points at the time. Coach Hopkins was willing to gamble playing Dickerson with 2 fouls but Coach Haase didn’t risk it. Each of Stanford’s primary big guys had 2+ fouls at the break.

Just as in the USC game, Dominic Green provided the Huskies with an offensive spark as he hit a pair of 3-pointers to lead off a 16-6 UW run which saw them take the lead at 28-27. He also pinned Travis’s 2nd foul on him by drawing a charge after the first of those baskets. However, Stanford didn’t let it get to them and the Cardinal came back to take the lead at halftime 35-33.

UW got off to a poor start yet again in the 2nd half. Stanford realized that their advantage was with size on the offensive glass and repeatedly drove the ball. The Huskies committed 5 fouls in the first 3 minutes of the half. Meanwhile on the offensive end UW went scoreless for a 6-minute stretch during which time the Stanford lead ballooned to 13 points.

As they’ve done all year the Huskies made a run to get back into the game. Jaylen Nowell took over the keys to the offense and Michael Carter III made a big 3-pointer to get the Dawgs within 6. Then David Crisp intercepted a long inbounds pass that almost led him straight to the hoop for a layup. The lead for Stanford got down to just 2 at 62-60.

But the Huskies’ magic finally wore out as Daejon Davis hit a 3-pointer and then Dorian Pickens hit another on the next possession. Then the Cardinal got some road cooking as Hameir Wright got called for a block when he was clearly set and David Crisp had his shot blocked by Davis when it clearly on replay hit the backboard first and should’ve been a goal tend. It didn’t matter as the Huskies couldn’t hit their foul shots down the stretch as they’ve done all season.

Nowell finished the game with 20 points to lead all scorers while David Crisp was the only other Husky in double figures with 11 points. This was a big missed opportunity for Washington as 6 of their next 7 games are either on the road or against top-25 teams.

Their next game is at Utah at 7pm on Thursday 1/18.

Key Observations

• Washington once again couldn’t make nearly enough outside shots to keep up in the scoring department. The Dawgs were 5 of 22 (23%) from deep. David Crisp, Jaylen Nowell, and Matisse Thybulle, their 3 leaders in attempts, were just a combined 2 of 17. Meanwhile, Stanford only made 4 from deep but that came on just 11 attempts for 36.4%.
• Both teams killed themselves at the free throw line. The Huskies continued their poor shooting night at the line to go 17/26 (65.4%). David Crisp went 0 for 4 including missing a pair late in the game. Not to be out done, Stanford was 15 of 28 at the charity stripe including missing 3 front ends of 1-and-1’s.
• To continue a theme, the Huskies predictably got killed on the boards. Stanford held a 48-28 advantage in that category including a 14-3 advantage on the offensive glass. Hameir Wright had a pair of rebounds that he couldn’t secure and bounced off him to a Stanford player when they were uncontested.
• The Huskies got an 18-10 advantage on turnovers but couldn’t capitalize on them. Unlike in previous games, not many of those came on the perimeter where they could lead to fast break points and instead just led to a missed shot against Stanford’s half court defense.
• The other advantage for Washington came in blocked shots where UW concluded with 12 of them as four Huskies had multiple of them. Most of them though went out of bounds which caused a miss but didn’t change possession.
• Another game, more criticism of David Crisp. He made his first 3-pointer and then didn’t do much else for the rest of the game. Crisp missed his last 6 attempts from deep and all 4 from the free throw line. Matisse Thybulle also really struggled on offense as he missed all 4 attempts beyond the arc and chipped in with 4 turnovers. But Nahz Carter had the worst game of any Husky with a terrible stretch in the first half which resulted in 3 turnovers and one missed shot attempt. He also fouled Stanford with 1 second on the shot clock for what would’ve been a shot clock violation with 2 minutes left in the game.

***

You can follow me for all your UW Men’s Basketball news @UWDP_maxvroom