Once-Plodding Stanford Completes Its Makeover

It is a few minutes after Stanford again has claimed Pauley Pavilion as its own, this time defeating UCLA with feet rather than forearms, and someone asks Mike Montgomery how it feels to at last coach a team blessed with speed. This is the sort of question he never heard while turning the Cardinal into a national power, and yet he is ready with a smidgen of sweet sarcasm.

“I guess you haven’t seen us run wind-sprints,” he says.

Montgomery can laugh because his team’s perimeter quickness no longer is laughable. Guard Julius Barnes and forward Josh Childress have liberated All-American shooting guard Casey Jacobsen and are delivering the Stanford offense into the era of the dribble drive.

“In the past, they’ve been a team that liked to slow down the tempo,” says UCLA forward Jason Kapono. “Now, they’re starting to break out of that. They’ve been known for their big guys, like the Collins brothers and Mark Madsen. Now, they’re breaking down their plays and going more one-on-one, driving.”

For all its astounding success in the previous four years--a Final Four, three consecutive Pacific 10 Conference titles, two No. 1 NCAA seedings--Stanford was a team trapped in a bygone era. In the mid-1990s, the introduction of the 35-second clock caused elite teams to shift their emphasis from low-post play to breaking down defenses with the dribble.

Stanford’s refusal to bend academic standards made it difficult for the basketball program to adapt. The coaching staff was able to sign big-time big men who met the requirements. On the perimeter, though, the Cardinal had to find ways to win with tall shooters Pete Sauer and Ryan Mendez rather than with the dynamic athletes that Duke, Arizona and Michigan State had.

Jacobsen was only a partial solution to that problem in his first two years. He instantly became one of the best players in the school’s history, but his jump shot remained his primary weapon. As a sophomore in 2000-01, he produced 42% of his scoring on three-pointers. By comparison, Michigan State’s Jason Richardson got just 29.7% of his points on threes.

The nature of this year’s Stanford team has changed Jacobsen. Barnes is a high-flying 6-2 junior who is a bit volatile to be a full-time point guard, but he can be devastating when playing under control. New Mexico Coach Fran Fraschilla calls Barnes “probably their toughest player to guard.” Childress is a smooth, 6-8 freshman who glides to the goal and is dangerous behind the three-point line.

They make it more difficult to double-team Jacobsen. To try is to risk opening driving lanes. When opponents play straight up, the Cardinal can spread the floor and give all three players room to attack the goal. Jacobsen, though still often shooting from long range, now gets slightly more than a third of his points from behind the arc.

Even with that improvement, and even with star-quality players in Jacobsen and 7-foot center Curtis Borchardt, this is not a perfect team. The point guard situation is too fluid, with Montgomery alternating Barnes, senior Tony Giovacchini and freshman Chris Hernandez.

In previous years, Stanford almost always had to run plays to generate scoring opportunities. Few teams executed as proficiently, but there were no answers when shot-clock pressure developed.

In their victory over UCLA this season, the Cardinal enjoyed a luxury they never had in recent years.

Bruin assistant Jim Saia dedicated his team’s defensive game plan to undermining Stanford’s sets, and it worked well enough to generate a double-digit first-half lead. Montgomery’s response was to spread the court and allow Barnes and Childress to drive the ball at the defense.

“Julius made some really nice athletic plays that some other guys can’t make,” Montgomery says. “Josh is a different sort of athlete. He’s pretty quick off his feet, pretty quick in a 10-foot run, but not very fast as far as changing ends. But he gives us point-of-attack stuff that we’ve not had.

“It’s clearly an advantage. Speed and quickness and athleticism in basketball--it’s huge.”

The Cardinal’s lack of quickness on the perimeter was an issue in the past three NCAA tournaments, when the team fell short of justifying its seed each time. As a No. 2 in 1999, Stanford was run out of the tournament by Gonzaga. A year later, promoted to a No. 1, the Cardinal was ousted by North Carolina.

Stanford was a top-seeded team again last year and struggled against St. Joseph’s (Marvin O’Connor drove the Cardinal nuts with 37 points) and Cincinnati (Kenny Satterfield slashed for 24 points and forced Stanford into a zone). Although Maryland was not a true speed team, there was no one to keep up with elusive Juan Dixon, who scored 17 points on seven-of-10 shooting.

This season, the Cardinal’s athletic renaissance has not yet had its full effect on the defense.

Childress is not strong enough or experienced enough to become a force at that end, although his ability to get off his feet and his long arms occasionally make him an overwhelming rebounder.

“Julius is quick enough to move his feet at the point of attack to keep his guy from beating him. If you do that, you don’t need help, and it really makes your defense a whole lot better,” Montgomery says. “We have to do a better job with fundamentals.

“We’ve never been quicker than everybody, historically, and we probably never will be.”

At the least, Stanford is quicker than before. That’s a fair head start on a more fulfilling tournament run.