Sun Devil men's basketball just came off a rough road trip that included loses to the U of A, Utah, and Colorado. Coming back home to friendly confines, ASU had two more games in the regular season to tighten up loose ends before they travel to Las Vegas to compete in the annual Pac-12 Tournament.
The ASU men's basketball team (15-15, 5-12 in Pac-12) opened up the last weekend of regular season basketball against Pac-12 opponent Stanford (15-13, 8-9 in Pac-12).
In their previous meeting in Palo Alto, the game was closely contested and ultimately won off senior Rosco Allen's game-winning jumper from the elbow to propel the Cardinal.
Early-on changes were apparent in the Sun Devil scheme, more so on the defensive end.
"It's been more of a philosophical change," ASU head coach Bobby Hurley said.
Hurley later added that the change was for the purpose of "not allowing dribble penetration. In the loss at Arizona, especially in the second half, they got to the front of the rim way too much. Our help side defense has been better. At Colorado it was better, even though we didn't win the game, we won the paint."
The newly implemented defensive game plan not only aided in the battle in the paint but also gave the shorter ASU team a substantial rebound advantage.
"We just rebounded the ball and controlled them defensively," ASU junior forward Savon Goodman said to the success his team had on the glass.
The Sun Devils out-rebounded the Cardinal 38-27, 15 of ASU's rebounds coming on the offensive glass to Stanford's 5 offensive rebounds.
Hurley also addressed his team's streakiness and hustle that was shown in the first half.
"I think it boils down to our energy, our activity, you saw it at the end of the half how aggressive we were with our defense and it carries over to other departments"
ASU carried their good play into the second half, closing out the Cardinal 74-64, evening the season series at a game a piece.
ASU senior forward Eric Jacobsen ushered his teammate's earlier statement, summing up the game saying "It was all in the defense."
The Sun Devils will surely need defense going up against the explosive Cal-Berkeley offense come Saturday.
Reach the reporter at Braxton.Fox@asu.edu or follow @braxton_fox_II on Twitter.
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