Starting Five nearly set

Jake Curtis speculates:

"Who will be the starting five for Stanford’s women’s basketball team this season? Only one spot seems undetermined at this point, although things could change." Read more...

Madness begins for Stanford women

As basketball practices got underway this Friday, Stanford Women's Basketball continued its preparation for the 2012-13 season and its quest for a third national title.

Read all about it in this article by Stanford Athletics.

Note: The article says that the women will be holding an open workout beginning at 6 pm, but the workout actually runs from 5:30-6:00, so be sure to get to Maples in time for that.

Cardinal-White Friday Frenzy

Stanford Athletics presents the first-ever preseason men's and women's basketball event: Friday Frenzy on October 19.

There'll be women's open practice from 5:30 to 6:00, men's scrimmage from 7:00 - 8:00 and more in between.

You can find all the details here.

12 women to watch

The first game is a bit less than a month away, and Kevin Danna writes about 12 women to watch in the Pac-12. Chiney, of course, is one of them.

Here are your freshmen

Just 44 days until the first game!

These are the new faces we'll be seeing at Maples:

Alyson Beebe is a 6'3" forward from Santa Maria, California. Aly missed her high school senior year of basketball as she recovered from a torn ACL. She averaged 20.1 points and 12.5 rebounds as a junior and was named a prep All-America honorable mention after leading Saint Joseph High to a 29-6 overall record and the CIF Division III title. In the title-clinching contest, Aly scored a game-high 21 points.

We won't be seeing Aly on the court this season. She's rehabbing from surgery for a second ACL tear. I expect that she'll be kept busy on the sideline leading the high-fives for three-pointers.

Kiran Lakhian is a 5'10" shooting guard from Plano, Texas, just north of Dallas. Kiran was the tallest player on her West Plano High team and was listed as a forward. But she did a little bit of everything and was used at all five positions.

Tess Picknell is a 6'5" center from just north of the border — Medford, Oregon. Tess helped lead South Medford High to the quarterfinals of the Oregon 6A tournament last season and was named All-Oregon second team after averaging 13 points, nine rebounds and about five blocks per game. She blocked 13 shots in one game.

Stanford Athletics chatted with Kiran and Tess today, just before their first official day of classes. Read here ...

Stanford Photo has published photos of all the 2012-13 team and staff members. See here ...

Chiney named to preseason Wade Watch List

Congratulations Chiney!

This season's honors for Chiney begin with her nomination to the State Farm Wade Trophy Division I Player of the Year preseason "Wade Watch" list that was announced today by the Women's Basketball Coaches Association. This is Chiney's second year on the list.

For more information, see:

• The WBCA announcement
• The Stanford Athletics announcement

Players getting ready to return

By FBC reporter Judy Richter:

The Stanford women’s basketball team’s 2012-13 odyssey will officially get under way at 10 a.m. Saturday, Sept. 15, with the first team meeting.

The players will spend the day going over compliance rules, undergoing physicals, unpacking their uniforms and other gear, practicing and – just for fun – attending the home football game against USC later in the afternoon, according to Eileen Roche, director of basketball operations.

Freshman orientation is Sept. 17, followed by a convocation Sept. 18 and the first day of classes Sept. 24.

The team’s three freshmen – guard Kiran Lakhian, forward Aly Beebe and forward/center Tess Picknell – presumably have a pretty good idea of how to get around campus after attending summer school. Most of their returning teammates also went to summer school or spent time on campus while working at head coach Tara VanDerveer’s hoops camps.

During September, NCAA rules allow the team to practice only eight hours a week, including conditioning, Eileen said. Between Oct. 1 and Nov. 9, the official start of the season, it can practice 30 days. The two exhibition games – against Corban on Nov. 1 and against Vanguard on Nov. 3, both at home – don’t count against practice time, she said.

Because the women’s volleyball and men’s basketball seasons overlap or coincide with women’s basketball, the three teams must coordinate practice times in Maples Pavilion. The WBB practice slot is 4-7 p.m. until January, when it will change to 1-4 p.m. These times were mapped out in advance to give the athletes a chance to schedule their classes accordingly.

Although exhibition games have generally proven to be easy wins for Stanford, the opposing coaches have been eager to play the Cardinal to give their players experience against an elite team. The benefit to Stanford is that “it lets us play everybody,” gives the Stanford players game experience and lets the coaches get a feel for lineups and rotations. “It’s a win-win” for everybody, Eileen said.

The staff is still working out details of other events such as the traditional open practice in October, chalk talks before the games and post-game talks. Scheduling will be complicated by the fact that the Arrillaga Family Sports Center is being expanded on the east side toward the aquatic center. That means that Dallmar Court won’t be available for post-game gatherings.

One change in staffing is that Susan Borchardt, assistant sports performance coach, is taking a year’s sabbatical so that she and her three young children can join her husband, Curtis Borchardt, while he plays professional basketball overseas. She will be replaced by Kurtis Rayfield, who worked with her as a graduate assistant last season.

The season schedule features some unusual game times because of the advent of the Pac-12 Network. The new network means that more games in more sports will be televised, but it also has required some juggling of game times, Eileen said.

In the meantime, “We’re figuring it out. We’re just going to play ball,” she said.

Stanford Women's Basketball announces 2012-13 schedule

Stanford Women's Basketball announced the 2012-13 schedule this morning.

As we have come to expect, it's tough and challenging. Seven of the Cardinal's opponents played in the NCAA tournament last season. Stanford will play Baylor at the Jack in the Box Rainbow Wahine Classic in Honolulu the weekend before Thanksgiving. Stanford travels to Knoxville this year for its annual game vs Tennessee, and UConn comes to Maples.

In conference play, Stanford plays Arizona and Arizona State only at home and Washington and Washington state only away. They play the other seven Pac-12 teams both at home and away. In an unusual bit of scheduling, Stanford and Cal play both of their games in the same week. Most of the conference games are scheduled for Friday and Sunday this season instead of Thursday and Saturday.

This is the announcement and the schedule from Stanford Athletics.

This is the schedule from the FBC, which will include FBC pre-game and post-game events as well as the basketball games when that information becomes available. It also includes links to each opponent's women's basketball website and maps of the venues.

USA Women win first 3x3 world championship

Chiney, Skylar, Bria and Ann took home the gold from Athens today by defeating Australia 19-18 in the semifinals, then coming back from a 5-point deficit to defeat France 17-16 in the championship game.

This is Chiney's third gold medal and the most precious one because, "We worked the hardest for it. Just four people trying to win a gold together, it was just amazing."

Here is the full report of today's activities from USA Basketball.

Photos from FIBA of the champions:

and of Chiney in action during the gold medal game:

USA women going for the Gold

Chiney, Skylar, Bria and Ann have advanced to the semifinal round of the FIBA 3x3 world Championship by defeating Estonia 21-11 in the eight final round and Hungary 21-8 in the quarterfinals today.

They are scheduled to play Australia (also undefeated at 7-0) at 10:00am PDT on Court 1 tomorrow. The other semifinal will be between Ukraine and France at the same time on Court 2. The bronze medal game is at 12:00pm PDT on Court 2, and the gold medal game is at 12:30pm PDT on Court 1.

The USA Women's semifinal game and the gold medal game are scheduled to be streamed live online. The other two games tomorrow are not.

Here's the full report of today's action from USA Basketball.