Buffs Gear For Visit From Pac-12 Foe Stanford

BOULDER — When the Colorado Buffaloes and Stanford Cardinal last met, the Buffs scored just four points in the final 10 minutes of the game — and still won.

Safe to say Stanford players haven't forgotten that 56-55 Colorado win on Jan. 3 on the Cardinal's home floor. It will no doubt be at least in the back of their minds when the two teams meet again Wednesday at 7 p.m. at the Coors Events Center (Pac-12 Networks).

"I'm sure their players feel like they could have won that game," CU head coach Tad Boyle said earlier this week. "They think they should have won that game. We've got to challenge our guys. This is a much-improved Stanford team from where they were on Jan. 3. They've gotten better."

The 15-5 Buffs and 11-7 Cardinal enter the game with identical 4-3 records in Pac-12 play — two of six Pac-12 teams currently sitting just one game behind league co-leaders Washington and Oregon. With six games between the top eight teams on tap for this week — a week that will also mark the halfway point of the conference season — Boyle has called it "separation time."

"It's time to separate ourselves and the only way you do that is by winning the next game and hopefully getting on a little bit of a run," Boyle said. "But you can't get on a run unless you win the next game."

The Cardinal come to Boulder on the heels of a narrow 75-73 win over Arizona State, a game in which Stanford saw a double-digit lead disappear before collecting the win on a Rosco Allen basket in the final seconds. Allen leads the Cardinal in scoring, averaging 14.5 points per game, and he's followed by Marcus Allen (12.6 ppg), Dorian Pickens (11.4) and Michael Humphrey (10.7).

Rosco Allen had just seven points on 2-for-10 shooting in their first meeting. Doing the most damage was 6-9 sophomore Humphrey, who scored 19 points and grabbed eight rebounds.

"Rosco Allen did not have his best game against us and we snuck out a win by one," Boyle said. "We know he's a good player, Marcus Allen is a much-improved player. They're good. They're better than they were when we played them."

Along with the win over ASU, the Cardinal's resume also includes home wins over Utah and Cal — two teams that have beaten CU this season — and a road win at Oregon State. The Buffs will have a second chance against Cal on Sunday when the Bears pay a visit to the CEC for a 3 p.m. game.

Among the concerns for the Buffs will be taking care of the ball (limiting turnovers) and perimeter defense. The Buffs are last in the Pac-12 in assist-to-turnover ratio, with 92 turnovers and 85 assists in conference play. As for defense, they'll be aiming to stop a trend in its tracks — in the Buffs' last two games, opposing point guards have averaged 30 points per game.

Still, the Buffs are doing a good job in adhering to Boyle's foundation: overall defense and rebounding. CU is second in conference play in rebound margin (plus-6.7 per game) and is tied for fifth in the league in scoring defense (70.9 per game).

"It always starts with defense and rebounding for us," Boyle said. "Hopefully we can stay aggressive for 40 minutes. Obviously, playing at home, playing at altitude, we'd like to get a transition game going. We'd like to get a fast pace, up and down. I think controlling tempo would be a key and we'd like to control it. Again, we do that with our defense."

Offensively, they're also generating a balanced attack. Senior Josh Scott is averaging 15.9 points in league play, along with 10.9 rebounds per game, while sophomore wing George King is scoring at a 14.4 pace in league games. King has hit double figures in each of his last three games, including a 22-point, five-rebound effort in the win at WSU — his highest points-rebounds combined total since a mid-December win over BYU.

One player the Buffs would like to see regain his early season form is wing Josh Fortune. The Buff junior finished non-conference play on a hot streak, hitting 11 of his last 21 3-point attempts (.524). But since then, he's shot just 8-for-23 from 3-point range in league play (.348), and after averaging more than 11 points per game in nonconference play, he's averaging just more than seven per game in Pac-12 games.

A category that's been a boon for the Buffs in league games has been free throw percentage, where they lead the Pac-12 at .765 (117 for 153).

But tops on the Buffs' to-do list is simply taking care of their home court. With six home games remaining, they know it's imperative to make sure they protect their floor.

"If we want to get to where we want to get, top half of the league, competing for a league championship, you have to win at home," Boyle said. "That's where we need our fans. We really need a great home-court atmosphere. With the combination of altitude and great energy in this building, we're hard to beat."

REMEMBER THE 10: Wednesday marks the 15th anniversary of the plane crash that claimed the lives of 10 people, including two Oklahoma State basketball players, six OSU staffers and two pilots. The plane was one of three OSU planes that left Jefferson County Airport after the Cowboys had played Colorado at the Coors Events Center.

The plane crashed on the Eastern Colorado plains near Strasburg and there were no survivors. Those killed in the crash were OSU players Daniel Lawson and Nate Fleming, Oklahoma City broadcaster Bill Teegins, OSU athletic media relations coordinator Will Hancock, student assistant Jared Weiberg, director of basketball operations Pat Noyes, athletic trainer Brian Luinstra, broadcast engineer Kendall Durfey, and pilots Denver Mills and Bjorn Fahlstrom.

The memorial is approximately 30 miles east of the I-70 and Pena Boulevard interchange off the Strasburg exit.

Contact: Neill.Woelk@Colorado.edu