by Matt Harrington

PALO ALTO–When I looked at the final score sheet after the Stanford Cardinal lost to the Washington State Cougars last Saturday 89-88 that was a bit of a stunner. It was a game that the Cardinal were up 27-14 at one point. Cardinal head coach Johnny Dawkins reiterated after the game Stanford didn’t put together a 40 minute effort and it’s been a little bit of a trend lately.

That was something that cost the Cardinal last Saturday as the Cardinal weren’t playing a 40 minute game. It was a little bit of a shocker and it was a bigger shocker the loss to UCLA on Thursday night. Your looking at a team that’s right there in the standings with them in the Pac 12 they both sitting there at 6-4.

UCLA and Stanford are looking to wrap up the number four seed and the bye that goes with it in the Pac 12 Tournament. Stanford with their loss to UCLA on Thursday their getting knocked out of that first round. Oregon and Oregon State are up there at 6-4 so there’s a lot of teams squeezing into this playoff. Stanford doesn’t have the easy road ahead, they do not they still have Utah to play and both Oregon schools, there’s another big one with Arizona on the way.

So the Cardinal are looking at a little bit of trouble if they want they want to dance in the NCAA Tournament they’ve got to start turning things around in a hurry. They know Washington State was a gimmie game but they lost, that was another game that should have been another gimmie game for the Cardinal but it’s not the way things are going right now.

The Cardinal if they show up the way they showed up in the first half of the game against UCLA the Cardinal shot about 30 percent from the field and the Cardinal could find themselves down pretty early. This is a chance for the Cardinal to figure out what’s going on to work on their output or a chance for them to struggle again if they get into their own heads their too worried about this two game losing streak the first one they’ve had all season.

There is a chance they could struggle in Sunday’s game, there is no longer a sure thing in the Pac 12 after that lost to the Cougars. It’s going to be a game where Stanford is going to rebound to struggle to do things right in their own head because so it’s going to be interesting. Washington State their starting to turn things around they looked like the doormats earlier in the year but in the last couple of weeks they looked like they’ve been playing some come back basketball and that’s probably why the Cardinal lost to them because Washington State are getting momentum.

Matt Harrington does weekly commentary on the Stanford Cardinal each week for http://www.sportsradioservice.com