Photo credit: @StanfordMBB

By: Ana Kieu

Stanford Cardinal men’s basketball surely showed that they were the Comeback Cardinal in Wednesday’s thriller against the rival USC Trojans 79-76 at Maples Pavilion. The Cardinal (13-11, 6-6 Pac-12) certainly rebounded after a rough two-game road trip in the Beaver State against Oregon and Oregon State this past weekend. Now the Cardinal will seek their second straight win over the lowly UCLA Bruins, who currently stand at 13-12, 6-6 Pac-12 in the conference standings. That’s clearly not super low to the point of being a hapless team, like, say, my alma mater San Jose State University, but they’re just a step below the Cardinal and this should be a winnable game for the home team as long as the Bay Area big men continue to play with grit throughout the two halves.

In case you missed it, Stanford not only celebrated the exhilarating win over USC Wednesday with its head coach Jerod Haase, but also a familiar face in football head coach David Shaw, who appeared to be really happy to be back on the Stanford University campus as the Cardinal support each other, no matter what teams they play for or what genders they describe themselves as.

Check out the Cardinal’s postgame celebration in the embedded tweet below.

As you should already know, Stanford took matters into their own hands and gutted out a gutsy win over USC and also carried some momentum into Saturday’s rivalry matchup. Well, at least a fan rivalry in the minds of those who follow these two Pac-12 schools.

I’d also like to mention that Bryce Willis was clutch down the stretch against USC and even threw in the much-needed game-winner to help the Cardinal get ahead for the win.

Since both teams aren’t leading the conference, I believe Saturday’s Pac-12 matchup will feature a lot of back-and-forth action along with fluctuating leads and deficits. As long as there are runs for the money, they’ll be strides to try even harder over the course of the game itself. But I predict that Stanford will somehow pull off a win, so my prediction will be 80-75 Stanford. Let’s see how I’ll do Saturday.