Stanford Wins a Rematch With Texas and a Trip to the Final Four
SPOKANE, Wash. — The reigning champions are back in the Final Four. No. 1-seeded Stanford beat No. 2 Texas, 59-50, on Sunday to reach its 15th N.C.A.A. tournament national semifinals.
The Cardinal were cheered on by a Spokane Arena crowd decidedly in their court thanks to fans of the Hull twins, Lexie and Lacie, who grew up in Spokane. Lexie Hull was the game’s leading scorer with 20 points on 7 of 14 shooting.
The game was chippy, physical and fast from the tip-off, with each side blocking shots and making tough looks. It was exactly the pace and style the Longhorns sought, though Stanford still found ways to score. Lexie Hull particularly seemed to feed off the crowd’s enthusiasm for her and her sister, scoring 5 points in the game’s first six minutes and finishing the first half with 12.
Free throws were traded starting early in the game, as were tough defensive plays. At one point, Lacie Hull blocked a shot for a steal on one end, and then Texas’s Aliyah Matharu took a charge in transition on the other. The first quarter ended 14-14 after Haley Jones hit a tough buzzer beater, but Texas had held Stanford scoreless for five minutes before that.
The Cardinal made just 39.3 percent of their shots from the floor in the first half, but went into the locker room with a 3-point lead — in part thanks to poor free-throw shooting from the Longhorns. Any time Texas would lose patience and start playing too aggressively, Stanford would make it pay either by making its free throws or by finding an open player along the baseline.
It looked like Stanford might have found some separation early in the third, when Lauren Ebo, the Longhorns’ leading rebounder, picked up her second and third fouls in the first two minutes of the quarter, and Stanford forward Cameron Brink scored 5 straight points in that same period.
But Texas kept getting stops, even when it could not consistently convert them into points, and tied the game again. The senior guard Audrey Warren contributed crucial 3-point shots to keep the Longhorns within striking distance, and played impressive defense on Haley Jones.
Jones was able to bring Stanford’s lead back up to 5 points by the end of the third quarter, when she was fouled shooting a 3-point shot and made all her free throws. A 5-point lead is exactly what the Cardinal had brought into the fourth quarter of their first matchup against the Longhorns this season — a defeat to Texas on their home court in November for one of only three losses this season.
The push and pull continued in the fourth, but the Longhorns were never able to get back ahead and replicate their early-season upset. Texas came within 2 points in the final minutes, but continued to be haunted by missed free throws. The Longhorns finished 11 of 20 from the free-throw line.
Jones finished with a double-double thanks to her consistency at the line, where she shot 10 of 11. Jones had 18 points and 12 rebounds and was named the most outstanding player in the Spokane regional.
Ultimately, Stanford took control of the low-scoring game, and successfully avenged its loss. Texas was eliminated in the round of 8 for the second straight year.
