Scouting report: No. 2 seed Arizona Wildcats vs. No. 10 seed Stanford Cardinal

Probable starters

ARIZONA

G Kerr Kriisa (6-3 junior)

G Courtney Ramey (6-3 senior)

F Cedric Henderson (6-6 senior)

F Azuolas Tubelis (6-11 junior)

C Oumar Ballo (7-0 junior)

STANFORD

G Michael O’Connell (6-2 junior)

G Spencer Jones (6-7 senior)

F Brandon Angel (6-8 junior)

F Harrison Ingram (6-7 sophomore)

C Maxime Raynaud (7-1 sophomore)

How they match up

How they got here: Arizona went 14-6 in the Pac-12 to finish in a second-place tie with USC but earned the Pac-12 Tournament’s No. 2 seed because it beat the Trojans twice during the regular season.

Stanford went 7-13 in the Pac-12 to finish in 10th place, then beat seventh-seeded Utah 73-62 in a first-round game on Wednesday. Forward Brandon Angel had 16 points and 12 rebounds to lead Stanford, which shot 41.9% from the field but committed only four turnovers.

The season series: Arizona played Stanford only once during the regular season, and it was one of the Wildcats’ worst losses of the season.

Azuolas Tubelis struggled with foul trouble throughout a 17-minute appearance, collecting only four points and no rebounds, while the Wildcats lost 88-79 on Feb. 11 at Maples Pavilion. Arizona shot 45.9% from the field, with Courtney Ramey making 8 of 16 3-pointers, but Stanford shot 61.1% and dominated the Wildcats inside. Stanford outrebounded UA 34-26 and outscored the Wildcats 42-24 in the paint.

Pac-12 Tournament history: Arizona is 5-1 against Stanford in the Pac-12 Tournament, losing to the Cardinal only in the quarterfinals of the 2008 event. But the Wildcats received a scare in last season’s quarterfinals.

In a game that featured 22 lead changes, Arizona edged Stanford 84-80 despite losing guard Kerr Kriisa to a severely sprained ankle that kept him out for the Wildcats’ final two games of the Pac-12 Tournament and the first game of the NCAA Tournament. Christian Koloko led the Wildcats with 24 points, nine rebounds and four assists, while Bennedict Mathurin had 20 points and seven rebounds. Stanford hit 11 of 20 3-pointers.

Overall series history: Arizona has lost three of its past six games against Stanford, dating to a 78-75 loss in Santa Cruz, California, in the COVID season of 2020-21. But the Wildcats lead the series 71-32 overall.

What’s new with the Cardinal

Counting its Feb. 11 win over Arizona, Stanford went 7-6 in its last 13 Pac-12 games. After beating the Wildcats, the Cardinal went on to lose at UCLA and USC, then lost at home against Washington State. They then beat Washington and Oregon State before losing at Oregon in their regular-season finale.

Stanford settled into a lineup that features three big wings — Harrison Ingram, Spencer Jones and Brandon Angel — along with 7-footer Maxime Raynaud and guard Michael O’Connell. The lineup, which is heavily supplemented by 6-5 grad transfer Michael Jones off the bench, allows Stanford the versatility to switch off opponents’ ball screens at every position, as it did against Arizona. Offensively, Stanford led the Pac-12 in 3-point shooting percentage in conference regular-season games (37.9).

Stanford’s leading scorer, Spencer Jones, left Wednesday’s game with 1:29 left after suffering a jammed pinky on his left (non-shooting) hand. But he is expected to play Thursday after undergoing an immediate X-ray at T-Mobile Arena.

The scout says

“They’re very comfortable in their roles, and that’s always good for a team. They feel good. They’re playing with a light heart. The struggles they went through kind of bonded them.

"I think they’ll switch (off screens again). I thought we were good against the switch at their place. Down the stretch we were not, but our offense was not the problem. It was more our defense. When somebody shoots 61% you have to give them a lot of credit, but you’re not doing things (well) defensively. It wasn’t the best day of our defense, that’s the way I would say it.

“When you have an all-American in foul trouble, you have to make adjustments. We’ve made adjustments (in other games) when Zu and Oumar (Ballo) have been in foul trouble.

“(Angel) is playing really good. He’s playing the four and five but is really a wing. He had a lot of shot fakes (against Utah) and was really good. At their place (when Angel had 14 points and three rebounds), he had a lot of big moments rebounding the ball, driving guys and making tough plays.”

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— UA assistant coach Riccardo Fois, who scouted the Cardinal

Key players

STANFORD — Spencer Jones

Of all the Cardinal’s similarly sized big wings, Jones may be the trickiest to deal with. In conference games this season, Jones averaged 15.4 points, pulled down 4.9 rebounds, blocked 13 shots over 20 games — and shot 41.2% from 3. He also has a track record against UA, scoring 28 points on the Wildcats in last season’s Pac-12 Tournament and 18 on Feb. 11 this season at Maples.

ARIZONA — Azuolas Tubelis

Arizona has been pretty good at the revenge thing this season, and nobody is more set up for this one than the Wildcats' standout power forward, who had his worst game at Stanford  — and struggled through a few below-average games after that.

Sidelines

Whack-a-mole

While Arizona has lost to six teams this season, the Wildcats have also beaten five of them. They avenged early losses to Utah, Washington State and Oregon while beating ASU and UCLA before the Sun Devils and Bruins beat them on their home courts.

Only Stanford has escaped the Wildcats’ thirst for revenge … because the Pac-12’s unbalanced schedule didn’t send the Cardinal to McKale Center this season. But Stanford’s 73-62 win over Utah in the first round of the Pac-12 Tournament means the Cardinal will instead have to face Arizona at "McKale North," otherwise known as T-Mobile Arena.

Stanford coach Jerod Haase indicated a second win over UA might be pretty difficult, even after his Cardinal dominated inside without Tubelis around much last month.

"We have to do different things with the defensive game plan, guys are gonna have to play their hearts out and we have to rebound the basketball as well," Haase said after Stanford beat Utah on Wednesday. "We understand (Tubelis) is a heck of a player, but they also have a team full of talented guys."

The Wildcats' unusual chance to offset all its losses is one thing, but Fois said there’s something else that matters here.

“It’s good if you get to the end of the season and have only lost six times,” he said.

Motivated 10-seed

Stanford could have entered the Pac-12 Tournament with little hope. The Cardinal were only the No. 10 seed, don’t have a great history in the conference tournament and can’t reach the NIT no matter how well they does this week.

But they can reach the NCAA Tournament by improbably winning four games in four days. The Cardinal took the first step on Wednesday by beating Utah, and center Maxime Raynaud was looking for more.

“Our goal is to win the Pac-12 Tournament,” Raynaud said. “If anyone has their mind somewhere else, they should not be here. We are competitors, and our whole season depends on it. We're just ready to fight.”

The Cardinal also have the confidence of knowing what can happen when things go well, as they did for Stanford on Feb. 11 against Arizona.

“First of all, we try to be tougher than them every single time, and I think you can see that through the number of rebounds we get," Raynaud said.

Stanford outrebounded UA by eight on Feb. 11.

"And last time, we were switching one through five, we were trying to front the post and be ready to be helping. I think we just did a great job with that," Raynaud continued.

“I'm sure they're going to make some adjustments. We're going to make some too, but still (it's) about how well you execute your plan.”

Numbers game

0 — Losses in six previous games at Las Vegas for Arizona under coach Tommy Lloyd.

2 — Arizona’s national rank in “average height” (6-7.4) as determined by Kenpom, which weighs the average listed height of players by minutes played.

3 — Stanford’s national rank in “average height” (6-7.2) as determined by Kenpom.

Watch: The best things Tommy Lloyd said ahead of the Pac-12 Tournament in Las Vegas

Hear what Arizona head coach Tommy Lloyd said about the Wildcats ahead of the Pac-12 Tournament.