Skip to navigation Skip to content Skip to footer
Official website of the Santa Clara broncos

Men's Basketball Takes to the Road to Face Stanford

Men's Basketball Takes to the Road to Face Stanford

SANTA CLARA, Calif. - After three straight at home to open the season, Santa Clara men's basketball will play its first road game on Saturday against Stanford.

Tipoff between the Broncos and Cardinal is set for 7 p.m. in Maples Pavilion.

The Broncos (3-0) won their first three games and are coming off the most impressive one. Behind 22 points and 10 rebounds from Guglielmo Caruso, 18 points from Trey Wertz and a defense that allowed only a 33-percent field-goal percentage, Santa Clara held off a late push from Washington State to prevail 70-62 on Tuesday. The Cardinal is the second of three Pac-12 opponents on this year's schedule.

Santa Clara led nearly the entire way in its first two games. The Broncos rolled past UC Santa Cruz (Nov. 5), an independent in Division III, by the score of 97-52 as six players reached double figures led by DJ Mitchell's 18 points. On Friday, Mitchell again tallied 18 points, Guglielmo Caruso posted his first career double-double (15 points/ 10 rebounds) and Tahj Eaddy scored 15 in a 77-63 win over Cal Poly.

Stanford (3-0) is also off to an impressive start, most recently defeating Long Beach State, 86-58, at home on Tuesday.

QUICK HITS...
• The Broncos are off to their first 3-0 start to a season since 2012-13 when they opened 5-0.
• Santa Clara has won its last three games against Pac-12 Conference competition, dating to last year's wins over USC and Washington State. The longest stretch in school history is five in a row between Dec. 12, 1994 (88-83 win vs. Oregon) and Dec. 6, 1997 (68-55 win vs. Oregon State).
• With a roster that features eight returning scholarship players and five newcomers, Santa Clara will play 13 of its 15 nonconference games at home.
• The Broncos return their top five scorers in Tahj Eaddy (15.0 points per game), Josip Vrankic (13.7), Trey Wertz (12.2), Keshawn Justice (9.7) and Guglielmo Caruso (6.4) from last year's team that went 16-15, including 8-8 in the WCC. Eaddy, who ranked third in the WCC in 3-pointers made (2.5 pg) and ninth in assists (3.2 pg), was a second-team all-conference pick. Vrankic earned an honorable mention nod after ranking 10th in the league in rebounding, eighth in field-goal percentage (52.0) and 10th in blocked shots (0.9 pg). Wertz led all WCC freshmen in both scoring and assists (4.7 pg). He set the Santa Clara freshman assist record (146) on his way to a spot on the WCC All-Freshman team.
• The roster, which returns 87 percent of the point production, 74 percent of the assists and 88 percent of the assists from 2018-19, features no seniors and only three juniors in Eaddy, Vrankic and DJ Mitchell, who is eligible after transferring from Wake Forest prior to last season. Juan Ducasse, who served a redshirt season due to a knee injury, is also eligible this year. The newcomers are guards David Thompson, Giordan Williams, Jalen Williams and Miguel Tomley, and center Jaden Bediako. Thompson is a junior-college transfer and the other four are true freshmen.
• Justice and Caruso were also among the most productive freshmen in the WCC last season. Justice was third on the conference's freshman scoring list and finished seventh on the school's freshman list for 3-point percentage (38.5) and tied for fourth in 3-pointers made (57). Caruso, who shot 52 percent from the field, tied for seventh in the WCC in blocked shots (1.0 pg). He also closed the season with a flourish, averaging 10.6 points and 5.9 rebounds in the last nine outings. Ezekiel Richards, another freshman in 2018-19, played in 29 games with five starts. He was first on the team in shooting from the floor at 53.1 percent.

GAMEDAY INFORMATION

Tickets Click here
TV Pac-12 Networks
Video Pac-12 Networks
Radio/Audio KDOW-AM 1220 | TuneIn
Live Stats Sidearm
Game Notes Santa Clara | Stanford

 

YEAR FOUR UNDER SENDEK...
The Broncos are in their 113th year, including fourth under Herb Sendek, who has been successful in each of his three previous head-coaching stops. With a resume that includes 18 postseason appearances and three conference coach of the year awards, Sendek, was one of the three youngest coaches with 400 or more career victories. Having led the Broncos to winning records in two of his three seasons, he is in his 26th season as a collegiate head coach with stops at Arizona State, North Carolina State and Miami (Ohio).

THE STANFORD SERIES...
The Cardinal leads the all-time series 51-25, but the teams are meeting for the first time in 11 seasons. They split the last four matchups, but prior to that, Stanford won eight in a row in a series that began in 1913.

BY THE NUMBERS
0...Number of seniors on the roster
2...Last season, the Broncos beat a pair of Pac-12 schools (USC and Washington State) in the same season was for the first time in 21 years (then the Pac-10). In 1997, they won at Oregon, 67-58, and defeated Oregon State, 68-55.
4...Number of starters returning - Tahj Eaddy, Trey Wertz, Josip Vrankic and Guglielmo Caruso
4:46...Amount of time the Broncos have trailed this season (all against Washington State, Nov. 12).
9...Number of underclassmen (four sophomores and five freshmen) on the roster.
40...The Broncos have held of their first three opponents to less than 40 percent shooting from the floor.
70...The Broncos were 10-3 last season when scoring at least 70 points. They are 3-0 this year.

RADIO/LIVE STREAM
Anthony Passarelli (play-by-play) and John Stege (analyst) call the action during the season on radio and through WCC Network at home. All Broncos home games and West Coast Conference contests (not on an ESPN platform, CBS Sports Network or BYUtv) will also be streamed through WCC Network (local blackout restrictions apply for games broadcast over the air). As in the past two seasons, a number of games can also be heard on either KDOW-AM 1220 or KTRB-AM 860. Saturday's game against Washington State can be heard on KDOW-AM 1220 and Tunein. The complete broadcast schedule will be available once the WCC finalizes broadcast outlets for league games.

TICKETS
There are a number of ticket options for 2019-20, which features 21 homes, including 13 during the nonconference portion of the slate. In addition to season tickets, single-game and game-plan packages are on sale. For questions, contact the Santa Clara Athletics ticket office at (408) 554-4660 or BroncoTickets@scu.edu.

FAN EXPERIENCE PACKAGES
Group-ticket options and Fan Experience Packages are available through the Santa Clara ticket office, which is open weekdays between 8:30 a.m. and 5:30 p.m. Contact Jesse Moreno, the team leader of sales and service, at (408) 554-4628 or jmoreno@scu.edu for further details.

Connect with the Broncos on Social Media
• Athletics: Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | YouTube | Snapchat
• Men's Basketball: Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | Snapchat

Day of Giving Closing In
March 2, 2020 Day of Giving Closing In