Stanford good in spurts in basketball win over Portland State

Jarrett Mann (22) and Jack Trotter defend/AP Photo George Nikitin

As Stanford showed in its victory over Virginia on Tuesday and its close overtime loss to No. 5 Kentucky on Wednesday, the Cardinal can be pretty good when it maintains its focus the entire game.

As Stanford showed in its losses to San Diego and Oral Roberts, it can be mediocre when it fails to find its rhythm and lets its opponent dictate play.

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In its final game before a two-week break for exams, the Cardinal combined both the good and the bad in an 83-64 victory over Portland State on Sunday at Maples Pavilion. There were times when Sanford (4-3) was totally dominant and seemed capable of blowing the Vikings off the court. But there were also times when the Cardinal could not get defensive stops for long stretches, allowing Portland State back into a game the Cardinal seemed to have under control.

“Our margin for error is so small,” Stanford forward Landry Fields said. “Just look at the personnel, at the youth and experience on our team, and we can’t afford to have lapses that more experienced teams can have.”

Stanford was dominating Portland State (1-4) for the first 11 minutes, when it built a 27-13 lead, but less than eight minutes later the game was tied as the Cardinal suddenly lost its momentum. The Vikings, who had lost to Washington by 56 points earlier this season, shot 65.2 percent in the first half, and coach Johnny Dawkins was not happy with that defensive effort. The Cardinal put together an impressive three-minute spurt in the second half to increase a four-point lead to 14 and played better defense in the second half to prevent another Portland State rally.

“I thought we played a little lackadaisical,” Fields said.

This may be what Dawkins will face all season – some games in which the Cardinal looks good for long stretches and some games when the Cardinal seems lost for periods of time. In the Pac-10 this season that should be good enough for some wins, though, because every team in the conference looks vulnerable.

Even Washington, which seems to be the favorite at the moment, looked beatable on Sunday as it had to overcome a 12-point deficit to beat Montana by four on the Huskies’ home court.

Stanford is getting better. It has won three of its past four games, and the one defeat in that stretch – the overtime loss to Kentucky – provided the biggest psychological lift.

“It was a positive,” Fields said. “We grew a lot in that game.”

Things are starting to sort themselves out for Stanford. For one thing, Fields and Jeremy Green have established themselves as the Cardinal’s two offensive certainties.

Fields scored 25 points on 10-for-17 shooting on Sunday, and he is now averaging 23.3 points a game, second best in the conference, behind only Washington State’s Klay Thompson. Green, who missed most of preseason practice with an ankle injury and a suspension for being arrested on suspicion of domestic violence, has settled into a groove after being out of sorts the first two games.

He scored 19 points on Sunday and made 5 of 8 three-pointers, and over the past five games, he’s averaging 17.6 points and hitting 52.6 of his three-pointers (20-for-38).

“He’s still working on his conditioning and some timing issues,” Stanford coach Johnny Dawkins, “but he complements Landry very well.”

The Cardinal is certainly better than it was at the start of the season when Dawkins had no idea what his starting lineup would be or what his rotation would look like. He still doesn’t have it ironed out completely, but it is a lot more settled now than it was a few weeks ago.

Jarrett Mann, who was not a starter in the opener, has established himself as the team’s No. 1 point guard and leads the conference in assists. He had eight assists on Sunday, raising his average to 5.9 a game.

Drew Shiller, who began the season as a starter, seems to have found his niche as a sixth man, collecting 11 points while hitting both his three-point shots on Sunday.

Andrew Zimmermann and Jack Trotter have assumed the two inside spots with the absence of Josh Owens (undisclosed medical condition), and Zimmermann is starting to get comfortable after not playing organized basketball for more than a year (he attended junior college last year but did not play in games). Neither is going to be a big scorer, although Trotter has shown he can hit an 18-footer with regularity.

“The rotation is starting to set in,” Fields said. “People are getting comfortable in their roles.”

The Cardinal has a long way to go to become a factor in the Pac-10 this season, but at least Dawkins has a better notion of what he has to work with than he did three weeks ago.

“We do have an idea of what our guys can do,” Dawkins said, “but we have to continue to get better defensively and on the boards.”