December 24, 2003

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Palo Alto Online

Plenty of work is ahead

by Rick Eymer

ow that the latest challenge to Stanford's men's basketball superiority has been abated for the time being, do the ninth-ranked Cardinal expect to relax over the Christmas holidays in preparation for their Pac-10 opener on Jan. 2 against visiting Washington State?

Not a chance.

"We're going to work right through the holidays," said Stanford junior center Rob Little. "We don't want to drop a game. We want to go into Pac-10 play undefeated. Southern Utah and Harvard may not be as good as Gonzaga, but we're taking them just as seriously. These games are just as important."

Stanford performed methodically well in dismantling the 13th-ranked Bulldogs, 87-80, on Saturday night in the first half of the Pete Newell Challenge doubleheader at the Oakland Arena.

The Cardinal (7-0 entering Monday night's game against Southern Utah) played well from the opening tipoff and never trailed against a team that has played perhaps the toughest schedule in the nation to date. Gonzaga (7-2) lost its season opener to Saint Joseph's at Madison Square Garden, and then ran off seven straight wins before running into Stanford.

Gonzaga won in Washington D.C. against Maryland and George Washington, and beat then No. 3 Missouri in Seattle. With an experienced and highly-regarded front court, the Bulldogs provided plenty of competition.

"It was important in our minds to prove to the rest of the country that we're capable of playing good basketball," said Little. "This was an NCAA tournament type of game with two big-time teams and two big-time coaches. This game mattered. We ended up making some big plays early and more or less taking it to their inside game."

Little and Justin Davis neutralized Gonzaga's inside game and Matt Lottich, who scored a career-high 34 points on 12-of-17 shooting (including 6-of-7 from 3-point range) shot the Bulldogs out of the Arena.

Lottich was named the Pac-10 Player of the Week, his second honor of the season, for his effort.

Minutes after the victory, Little was talking about the challenge of facing Southern Utah's 1-1-3 zone defense and how it was important to prepare for that. Harvard comes to town on Sunday for a 5 p.m. game and Stanford probably knows a little something about the Crimson, too.

It's enough to make coach Mike Montgomery proud. He has been preaching consistency to his team, and not just in their performance. The players are apparently paying attention.

"We try to maintain a high level of consistency in our preparation," Montgomery said. "A lot of it comes down to pure old effort."

Gene Hackman's character in "Hoosiers" has nothing on Montgomery. The movie's fictional coach, Norman Dale, believed no one person was bigger than the game of basketball, and that's how he coached, even though he did have one special player.

Montgomery has a cast of special players, one of whom is still sidelined. You can take Montgomery out of the 50s, but you can't take the 50s out of Montgomery. He's teaching old-fashioned principles to a new-fangled era of players, and he's able to incorporate all the advancements of the game into one concept: play the game as hard as you can.

"This team competes on a par with any team we've had, and that's all you can ask," said Montgomery. "That makes it rewarding. You can't help but be pleased."

Lottich, raised in the Chicago suburb of Winnetka, Ill., brings that Midwestern basketball mentality to the West Coast. He's like the kid in "Hoosiers" who tells the coach "I'll make it."

Lottich has been making big baskets all season, and Saturday was no different. When he started shooting he didn't miss.

"We have a lot of experience on this team," said Lottich, whose previous career high was a pair of 23-point performances against Oregon State and Arizona last year. "We've got guys who've been around and who knows the coach, the system and what we want to execute. I rely on people to get me open and I've got a good point guard to get me the ball. I made the shots, but those guys made it work."

It was a far cry from Lottich's performance against Gonzaga last year, when he missed all six shots he took and failed to score. That turned out to be just the start of Lottich's worst collegiate shooting slump. He showed on Saturday that he's not about to let history repeat itself; a lesson well learned.

"He competes every day," said Montgomery. "It took Matt awhile to continue to mature and play at this level but anyone who knows Matt never doubted he could do this."

Lottich was able to torch the Bulldogs from the outside because Little and Justin Davis were up to the task on the inside.

"Justin and Rob set the tone," said Montgomery. "I think Justin surprised them with his quickness to the ball and his aggressiveness. That was the best I've seen Rob in awhile in terms of activity, the boards and his presence."

Davis finished with 18 points and nine rebounds, though he actually lost two points and a rebound to Dan Grunfeld on the official box score. Little added 14 points and seven rebounds.

"I felt the vibe as soon as I stepped in here," said Davis. "I heard a lot of fan support when I walked out there. We noticed (Gonzaga) wasn't doubling down on us and that pretty much left us 1-on-1 with their post players. We had the ability to make one quick move and get to the basket."

Sophomore forward Matt Haryasz was also a force inside during his 14 minutes, collecting eight points and six rebounds. He's showing tremendous growth this season, adding to the depth in the front court.

Chris Hernandez also returned to action after missing a pair of games with back problems. He and Lottich combined to make all 10 of their free throws in the final 1:30, which helped preserve Stanford's margin of victory.

"There is no one spot you can try to take away because they can go somewhere else," said Gonzaga's Blake Stepp.

And Montgomery hopes they can go there consistently.

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