Stanford Runs Over USC; Cal Slips By UCLA

Stanford, on the strength of its most explosive first half of the season, had more than enough to hold off USC, 89-75, in a Pacific 10 Conference women’s basketball game Sunday at the Sports Arena.

The victory was the fifth consecutive for the Cardinal (12-7, 6-3).

The loss, before a crowd of 1,502, left USC Coach Chris Gobrecht doing another slow burn, as her young team, which had swept the Oregon schools two weekends ago, dropped to 8-11 overall and 3-6 in conference, after being swept at home by California and Stanford.

Sunday, the Cardinal led, 9-1, 18-8, 27-12, 36-18 and 46-23 while rolling to a 55-29 halftime lead.

“They hit us upside the head at the start, and we kind of stood back, kind of stunned,” Gobrecht said.

“We let them just mow us down. That’s as flat as any team of mine has ever come out for a game.”

Stanford was led by junior super-sub Lindsey Yamasaki, who scored 28 points in 31 minutes. The 6-foot-1 forward, who two games ago had zero points against Washington State, made 10 of 13 shots (including two for two from beyond the three-point arc) and added eight rebounds and five assists.

Tara VanDerveer’s team was poised for a run to another Final Four this season until it lost guards Jamie Carey (repeated concussions) and Susan King (knee). As it was, VanDerveer played eight players at least 12 minutes Sunday.

“You should have seen us before we lost Jamie and Susan--we were really loaded,” VanDerveer said.

USC had a 9-0 run early in the second half but Stanford squelched any possibility of a comeback when 6-2 freshman guard Nicole Powell (18 points) led a Cardinal surge that produced an 82-66 lead with four minutes left. Ebony Hoffman led USC with 21 points.