- Slug: Sports-ASU-Stanford, 582 words
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By MATTHEW TONIS
Cronkite News
TEMPE — Just a few short weeks ago, the No. 16 Arizona State Sun Devils were the hottest team in the Pac-12, if not the country. Winners of its first 12 games of the season, ASU rose to third in the country before dropping its first game of the season to Arizona in Tucson.
Since, ASU has been up-and-down, splitting each of its last two weekends, losing the first game of the sets to Colorado and Oregon, only to be followed up by close wins over Utah and Oregon State.
Senior guard Shannon Evans, whose 22 second-half points Saturday kept ASU from falling to 1-4 in Pac-12 play, said the Sun Devils are doing what they can to respond positively to their recent struggles.
“Just trying to practice hard everyday,” Evans said. “If you look across the country, everybody is going through little slumps and taking a few L’s, but we’re trying to just circle the wagon and get back on a winning streak.”
Their next chance to do that comes tonight when ASU goes to Palo Alto to face the new hottest team in the conference: the Stanford Cardinal.
Stanford, which finished non-conference play at 6-7, including a home loss to now-8-10 Eastern Washington, has surged to four consecutive Pac-12 wins, with sweeps over the Los Angeles schools and the Washington schools.
“They’re playing as well as anyone in the league and their record shows that,” ASU coach Bobby Hurley said. “They have something going right now.”
Not coincidentally, this four-game win streak, the longest active streak in the conference, comes on the heels of the Cardinal getting their full complement of players active for the first time all season.
First back was freshman forward KZ Okpala, who sat out the first 12 games of the season after failing to qualify academically.
But the big turn in the mind of Hurley came from the return of senior guard and Pinnacle High School graduate Dorian Pickens, who was injured in the second game of the season and did not play again until the first game of conference play. Since then, Pickens has topped 20 points twice, in wins over UCLA and Washington State.
“Getting Pickens back has been a game-changer from them in the league,” Hurley said. “They’re not the team that they were in the non-conference with him.”
But the star attraction for Stanford is redshirt junior forward Reid Travis, who was a First Team All-Pac-12 selection a season ago and averaged 20.3 points per game in three outings against ASU as a sophomore.
This season, Travis averages 20.1 points and 7.3 rebounds per game while shooting 52.5 percent from the field at 6-8, presenting problems in the paint for inexperienced ASU post players.
“He’s a load down there,” Hurley said. “He’s physical. He’s experienced. He’s shown more perimeter game than in the past.”
Indeed, Travis attempted — and missed — one 3-pointer prior to this season, but has attempted 32 attempts for the Cardinal this year, fifth-most on the team, and has made eight.
In college basketball, things can change in a snap, as both Stanford and ASU have seen since the start of conference play. And while the Cardinal hope things continue, Hurley is focused on righting his ship before too long.
“It’s fragile,” Hurley said. “You want to preserve it when you’re going well. And when you face some adversity, you have to find your gear again. And hopefully we’ll get that done soon.”
