For the second time in five days and the third time this season, Arizona State (14-16, 10-10 Pac-12) will take on Stanford (15-15, 8-10 Pac-12) Wednesday during the first round of the Pac-12 Tournament. The third meeting between Bobby Hurley and Jerod Haase’s squads this season comes with the stakes of extending one’s season on the line.
“If anything COVID has prepared us for, it’s that,” said Hurley Saturday following the Sun Devils’ 65-56 win over the Cardinal. “We’ve had so many scenarios already where we have to play the same team again. I don’t know who has the edge in those types of situations. I know that our guys felt like this was a game that we should’ve won, and we handled our business and got it done.”
Handling their business will be key for a Sun Devil team that has been one of the nation’s best in their last eight games. Since Feb. 12, when ASU went on the road and defeated Washington State, the Sun Devils are the nation’s 11th best team in barttorvik.com’s power ratings.
“I’m just happy that we’re playing well,” Hurley said Monday before the Sun Devils departed for Las Vegas. “We have the longest current winning streak, and it’s encouraging that we’re playing at a pretty high level.”
Over that time span, the Sun Devils have been the third-best defensive efficiency team in the country. Throughout their four-game winning streak and a stretch of seven wins in their last eight tries, Arizona State has held opponents shooting percentages in the 30s frequently. In that nearly quarter-season sample size, the Sun Devils have outperformed teams like Kansas, Kentucky, Arizona, and Villanova, groups that will all likely earn top four seeds when the bracket is released come Sunday.
“It’s important this time of year to know how to win, to feel like you’re going to win, to have been put in a number of different circumstances where you have to figure it out,” said Hurley, “and we’ve demonstrated that we can do that. Everyone feels a little bit of relief, though. Everyone that’s going into this tournament has hope and aspirations to win games.”
The blueprint has been laid out in the Pac-12 Tournament before. In 2019, Oregon came into the tournament on the bubble and as the conference’s No. 6 seed, defeated the top 3 seeds of Utah, ASU, and Washington in order to qualify for the NCAA Tournament. Last year, Oregon State made an improbable run to the title and parlayed that success as the no. 5 seed – and a group that otherwise would not have gone dancing – into an Elite Eight run. It can be done.
“It’s a unique situation because we know what we have to do. Our future depends on winning four games, so there’s a big picture view to it that we want to go and win four games. That’s our goal, but at the same time, you have to take it step-by-step. I told you guys, ‘no matter 1 through 9 and John Olmsted, everybody’s gotta be ready to play. If we’re going to have the chance to win some games in Vegas, we’re going to need everybody.”
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Early Tuesday morning, the Pac-12 Awards, which are voted on by the league’s coaches were announced. Junior forward Jalen Graham was named as an All-Pac-12 Second Team selection after a late season surge blossomed his numbers to 10.1 points per game and 4.5 rebounds per game on 49.8 percent shooting. Super senior guard Marreon Jackson, who displayed his defensive skills throughout last weekend, was named an Honorable Mention for All-Defensive honors.
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On Wednesday, the Sun Devils will tip off the Pac-12 Tournament with the 8-9 game at 1 p.m. MT. In both matchups with Stanford this season, the Cardinal have shot better than their season average from 3-point range. Haase’s group, which shoots 33.4 percent for the season, has shot 47.4 and 38.5 percent in the two matchups with ASU this year. On Saturday, ASU overcame a 2-for-17 shooting performance from three-point range because of a 23-for-34 performance on looks from inside the arc. If the Sun Devils can re-create the success they’ve had executing halfcourt offense against the Cardinal – where they’ve shot above 50 percent in the second halves of both games – ASU gives itself a great chance to win Wednesday afternoon. Should that happen, ASU would get a third crack at Arizona, which sits as a potential no. 1 seed in the NCAA Tournament.
“We’re at the point where we know our season is on the line,” said Hurley. “We just want to win no matter who is in front of us.”
You can’t argue anything other than that the Sun Devils are peaking. Now, the question becomes whether they can sustain the run and avoid losing with no room for error.
“Just because we’ve won a few games here in a row – we’re not entitled to anything this week,” Hurley said. “We have to earn it.”
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