Photo credit: gostanford.com

By Ana Kieu

Oscar da Silva scored 21 points and the Stanford Cardinal men’s basketball team beat the Montana Grizzlies 73-62 in the season opener for both teams on Wednesday night. da Silva led the Cardinal with 21 points.

Tyrell Terry added 13 points for the Cardinal, which improved to 87-14 all-time in season openers. Bryce Wills scored 11 points. Spencer Jones added 9 points.

Sayeed Pridgett scored 17 points to lead the Grizzlies, who have lost their last 11 games to Pac-12 teams. Derrick Carter-Hollinger scored 15 points. Josh Vasquez added 11 points.

Montana took its only lead of the second half 36-35 on a Carter-Hollinger free throw.

Stanford went on a 25-2 run over the next eight minutes to take control of the game. Montana went nearly six minutes without scoring during that span.

Stanford shot 50.0 percent overall, connected on 12-13 from the foul line and forced 17 turnovers.

Josh Vasquez hit a 3-pointer to give Montana 25-19 lead with 5:19 left in the first half. Stanford went on an 11-3 run the rest of the way to take a 30-28 advantage into halftime.

There were six lead changes and the game was tied on six other occasions in the first half.

With the win, Stanford improved to 2-0. Montana, however, fell to 0-2.

Stanford hosts Cal State Fullerton on Saturday night at 8:00 p.m. PT.