UO wbxb, Feb. 25

UO release – STANFORD, Calif. — Sabrina Ionescu’s ability to rise to the occasion was tested like never before Monday. As fans in Eugene and throughout the basketball world have come to expect, she was more than up to the task. On a day that tested her resolve like no other, Oregon’s star senior responded by rising to heights never before seen in the history of college basketball. In the process, she elevated to the No. 3 Ducks to a piece of their third straight Pac-12 Conference regular-season title, thanks to a 74-66 victory Monday night over No. 4 Stanford at Maples Pavilion. A day that began for Ionescu in Los Angeles, speaking before an estimated 20,000 mourners and a national television audience at the memorial for Kobe Bryant held in Staples Center, ended with the UO senior becoming the first player in NCAA basketball history — female or male — to reach 2,000 points, 1,000 assists and 1,000 rebounds in her career. “I tried to do everything I could to hold it together tonight,” Ionescu told ESPN in a postgame interview, “and my team helped me a lot.” Ionescu needed nine rebounds to achieve the historic milestone entering Monday, and she reached it early in the third quarter. It came on the way to the 26th career triple-double of her career — and her second on Oregon’s weekend road trip to her home turf in the San Francisco Bay Area. Ionescu had 21 points, 12 rebounds and 12 assists and Satou Sabally added 27 points with nine rebounds to lead the UO women to a season sweep of the Cardinal with Monday’s win. Oregon enters the final weekend of the regular season with a two-game lead in the Pac-12 standings over Stanford and holding the tiebreaker, ensuring that the Ducks will be the No. 1 seed in the conference tournament in Las Vegas beginning March 5.
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