Women’s basketball notebook: Gonzaga got the best from a motivated Stanford team, a sign of respect for Bulldogs

The Gonzaga women’s basketball team has much to learn after a challenging loss at Stanford on Sunday.

Losses have a way of exposing a team’s shortcomings. And there is much to learn from the worst loss (89-58) in coach Lisa Fortier’s 11 seasons.

Stanford, unranked in the preseason poll for the first time since 1999-2000, is unranked no more. The Cardinal (3-0) entered at No. 24 in the poll released Monday.

Stanford’s start includes a 94-65 win over Washington State on Thursday.

The Cardinal wasted no time getting after Gonzaga, opening a 10-0 lead that grew to 26-4 by the end of the first quarter. Stanford led 48-24 at halftime and its advantage grew to as many as 38 points in the second half.

“We have tremendous respect for Gonzaga,” Stanford coach Kate Paye said. “This is a longtime series. We’ve been in a lot of battles with them. We certainly have been on the other side of it before. It’s a game every year, especially in the preseason, it makes our team better, win or lose.”

Stanford had two specific reasons to be motivated Sunday. First, the Cardinal dedicated their court to highly successful coach Tara VanDerveer.

And Stanford fell 96-78 to Gonzaga at McCarthey Athletic Center last season.

Paye was asked if the loss a year ago was on the Cardinal’s minds.

“This home-and-away series (has been going on) for years, and there have been years that we’ve played them twice,” Paye said. “They have our attention all the time. It (last year) helped our team. We’re going to play them again next year and we’ll be totally focused then.”

Stanford had a solid game plan to defend Gonzaga’s leading scorer and fifth-year standout Yvonne Ejim. She finished with 12 points, seven less than her average from a year ago.

“We know that Gonzaga is an excellent team and Ejim is an excellent player,” Paye said. “And our team worked very hard to be very focused to guard (Ejim). Holding her to 12 points is huge.”

Stanford point guard Chloe Clardy was one of four players in double figures with 11 points. She said her team remembered last year.

“Like (Paye said) they’re an excellent team and they’re coached by an excellent coaching staff,” Clardy said. “Obviously, we didn’t like what happened last year and we had a bad taste in our mouth. We had to play and we had to compete.”

The announced crowd for the VanDerveer Court unveiling at Maples Pavilion was 3,865. Gonzaga had a sellout crowd of 6,000 against Stanford last year.

Now it’ll be interesting to see how Gonzaga fares Thursday when it returns home to take on California. The Zags beat the Bears 78-70 last year in Berkeley.

Bright spot

True freshman point guard Allie Turner has had two standout back-to-back games for the Zags.

From St. Louis, Turner scored 18 points in the opener against Montana and followed it up with a team-high 18 points against Stanford – all coming off the bench.

Turner was named the West Coast Conference Freshman of the Week on Monday.

She hasn’t started, but she’s played 62 minutes in two games, second most behind starting senior forward Maud Huijbens (64). Turner has made 12 of 20 shots (60%) from the field and 9 of 14 (64.3%) from 3-point range. She also had six rebounds in each game.

Whether Turner moves into the starting lineup remains to be seen. She wasn’t projected to play as many minutes as she has, but injuries to potential starters Lauren Whittaker, a 6-foot-3 freshman forward from New Zealand, and Tayla Dalton, a graduate transfer guard from Saint Mary’s, have given Turner an opportunity to shine.

“She’s just so steady,” Fortier said. “Freshman and fearless. That may be one of the synonyms for a freshman – fearless. (Freshmen) don’t know what they don’t know yet.”

Fortier likens Turner’s 3-point-shooting ability to Brynna Maxwell and the Truong twins from a year ago, among other former standout shooters.

“She’s a heckuva player,” Fortier said of Turner. “She spends a lot of time working on her game.”

Ejim has been impressed with Turner .

“Her confidence definitely bleeds into all of us,” Ejim said. “Her being sure of herself keeps everybody steady … That’s the presence we need on the court, catching and shooting with confidence, knowing that the people behind her trust in her shot. That’s so huge not only for her but for our team as well and the growth of our program.”

Fortier is looking forward to doling out minutes once she has a full roster.

“I’d love for us to have that as a problem,” Fortier said. “We’ll find a way. It’s a problem we’ll address down the line.”

Another watch list

Ejim was named to the 2025 Wade Award Watch list on Tuesday, the Women’s Basketball Coaches Association announced. She is one of 15 players on the list.

The award is presented to the best player in women’s basketball.

The Wade Trophy is in its 48th year and is the oldest and most prestigious national player of the year award for women. It is named after the late Delta State University head coach, Margaret Wade, who won three national championships.

JuJu Watkins of USC, Paige Bueckers of UConn and Madison Booker and Rori Harmon of Texas are also on the Ward list.

Ejim, the WCC player and defensive player of the year last season, is on multiple watch lists this year, including the Naismith Player of the Year, Katrina McClain Power Forward of the Year, Becky Hammon Player of the Year and the John R. Wooden Award.

New home inside

Washington State coach Kamie Ethridge said before the season that senior Tara Wallack had developed into a three-level scorer. She expects Wallack to be difficult to guard inside.

The 6-1 Wallack is averaging 16 points through WSU’s 2-1 start, and most of the scoring is coming inside.

“You catch in traffic, you pivot, you handle yourself, you use your dribble wisely, you use shot fakes and step throughs,” Ethridge said. “She’s become a master at that. She can score at all levels.”

Hit the road

WSU begins a six-game stretch on the road Saturday when it travels to Texas Tech (2-0).

The Cougars don’t play again at home until Dec. 13 against BYU.

What did the Cougars learn about themselves against Stanford?

“Everybody wants to be on the highway going 70 (mph) and we’re like in town going over speed bumps,” Ethridge said. “I feel like we’ve got potential to become a really great team. We’re just a little spotty in our execution. We make some glaring mistakes on defense. Stanford made us pay for every mistake we made.”

Ethridge said Stanford is much better than many believed it would be this early.

“Stanford is a beast of its own,” Ethridge said. “They clearly may be better than advertised. We did all we could to dissect that game and fix us. But we’re a long way away from being able to execute the way we need to. Not anything drastic, not anything that can’t be fixed.”

Close and encouraged

Eastern Washington left Pullman last week knowing it could and maybe should have beaten WSU. The Eagles fell 83-82 in overtime.

EWU coach Joddie Gleason likes the makings of her team.

“I just loved the way the kids answered every single time that Washington State threw something at us,” Gleason said. “We felt like we had some really good looks that we missed. We missed too many free throws.”

EWU (1-1) visits Washington (3-0) on Thursday.