Boy, did the ASU men’s basketball team need that one.

After dropping two straight home games, and with a road trip looming, the Sun Devils’ matchup with Stanford on Saturday afternoon at Wells Fargo Arena was about as “must-win” as it gets.

How did the Sun Devils respond?

ASU put together its best half of basketball of the season to jump out to a 37-point lead and then hung on in the second half for an 88-70 win over the Cardinal.

“Obviously, [it was] a great bounce-back game for us,” ASU coach Herb Sendek said. “[I’m] really proud of the way our guys regrouped and came out and played, especially in the first half.”

Sendek shook things up by taking senior guard Derek Glasser out of the starting lineup and replacing him with freshman guard Demetrius Walker.

“It’s obvious he’s been pressing,” Sendek said of Glasser. “I just wanted to let some of the air out for him, let him see the first few minutes until the media time out.”

Glasser had started 54 straight games until Saturday’s contest, but Sendek said he wasn’t trying to send any messages to the team by sitting down his senior leader.

“I wasn’t trying to prove any points,” he said. “I wasn’t even trying to be a mastermind. I was just trying to help a young guy who had been pressing a little bit catch his breath.”

Glasser said he respected his coach’s decision, and when he got to come into the game, he looked like a new player on defense.

“It’s no secret that I have been struggling, and the past two games I haven’t been holding my own on the defensive end,” Glasser said. “I didn’t deserve to start, and I wasn’t playing as well as other guys were.”

Whether the Sun Devils (15-7, 5-4 Pac-10) used Sendek’s decision as motivation or simply knew their season could be on the line isn’t important — ASU’s first half was special.

Led by the unconscious shooting of junior guard Ty Abbott, the Sun Devils had Stanford buried before the Cardinal (10-11, 4-5 Pac-10) knew what hit it.

Abbott connected on three 3-pointers, and junior forward Rihards Kuksiks hit another during ASU’s 13-2 to open the game.

Stanford cut the ASU lead down to 20-11 with 13:18 to play in the first half before the Sun Devils took control.

It was a quick but deadly strike.

ASU simply couldn’t be stopped on the offensive end and allowed nothing to the Cardinal on the defensive end during a 21-0 run that gave the Sun Devils a 41-11 lead with 9:15 left in the half.

Stanford simply was no match for the ASU offense during the run. The Sun Devils hit eight straight field goals, including four from beyond the arc.

“We made shots,” Sendek said. “We didn’t do anything dramatically different than we’ve done the last two games offensively. I’m not even sure it was a function of us getting better shots than we’ve gotten the previous games.”

There was no let-up after the dominating run.

ASU stretched its lead out to as much as 37 in the first half, taking a 54-22 advantage into the locker room.

Abbott simply couldn’t miss in the first half. He put on an offensive show, slashing to the basket for dunks and connecting on NBA range 3-pointers. In all, he finished the first 20 minutes with 22 points on 8-of-9 shooting and a perfect 6-of-6 from downtown.

“My teammates did a great job setting screens for me,” Abbott said. “Sometimes, you get some open looks and you just keep going. It’s like a snowball effect.”

Normally, after one team dominates the first half of a game, there is a natural letdown in the second half.

Stanford wasn’t going to die easy — it fought back.

The Cardinal began chipping away at the ASU lead and eventually cut the deficit under 20.

The Sun Devils held an 18-point advantage with 4:48 left, but Stanford had one more push left in it.

An 8-2 run cut the lead to just 77-65 with 3:36 left, which was plenty of time for the Cardinal to keep their momentum rolling, especially after Kuksiks turned the ball back over to Stanford.

Sophomore guard Jeremy Green had a good look at a 3-pointer on the other end to cut the lead to single digits, but it was an air ball.

Stanford was then forced to foul, and ASU got the ball in the hands of Glasser, who connected on 9-of-10 free throws to bring the lead back to over 20.

Green hit a 3-pointer at the buzzer to give the Cardinal 70 points, the third straight game ASU has allowed over 70.

The Cardinal was paced offensively by the top two scorers during conference play in the Pac-10. Senior forward Landry Fields led the way with 22 points and Green added 20, albeit on just 7-21 shooting and was non-existent in the deciding opening half.

Abbott finished just one point shy of tying his career high with 29 points and also hauled in a career-high 12 rebounds. Glasser had a double-double of his own, coming off the bench to contribute 12 points and 10 assists.

Kuksiks added 14 points, and freshman guard Trent Lockett added 17 points, six rebounds and eight assists.

The bottom line is that all of those numbers add up to one crucial point: ASU saved its season on Saturday, at least for the time being.

“We needed this win bad,” Glasser said. “[With] going up to the Washington [schools] this week [and] coming off a two-game losing streak at home, this was one of the biggest games for us. I’m just really proud of how we responded.”

Reach the reporter at andrew.gruman@asu.edu