Emotions were raw for all involved with the WSU men’s basketball team Thursday night as Ernie Kent returned from Illinois to Pullman to coach his team against Stanford after spending two days with his 87-year old mother as she recovered from suffering a stroke. 

The Cougs (9-17, 1-13 Pac-12) may have dropped their 12^th straight game to the Cardinal (13-11, 6-7), 72-56, in a game Stanford led for more than 36 minutes, yet another deflating result for WSU tangentially detracts from the bigger picture in this ballgame.

“It’s not an easy situation,” Kent said of his mother. “I’ve done this before. I actually had to go and bury my dad and fly out to meet my team in Buffalo for the NCAA tournament when I was at Oregon.” 

Stanford entered the contest ranked last in the Pac-12 in 3-point field goal percentage (.325), but with effective penetration from guards Dorian Pickens and Marcus Allen, who combined for 24 points, the Cardinal hit nine 3-pointers compared to the Cougars’ three to quell any of the brief runs WSU made in either half. 

A Brett Boese three off a fast-break pass from junior point guard Ike Iroegbu capped a nifty 5-0 run to bring the Cougs back within one at 12:48, but Stanford immediately responded with an 8-0 run of its own to up its lead to 23-14 in a stretch where WSU did not find the basket for more than six minutes. 

“Just the same thing for every Pac-12 team I guess,” said junior guard Que Johnson, who finished with 14 points. “Three-to-four minute stretches where we don’t get stops or we don’t get buckets. We’ve got to get better about being mentally tough when those stretches come.” 

An 11-point halftime deficit of 35-24 proved to be too much for WSU to overcome in the second half as its first half shooting percentage of .292 (7-24) caught up to it while Stanford went 13-for-29 (.448) with 21 first half points tallied between bigs Rosco Allen and Michael Humphrey. The Cougs also had more made free throws (nine) than they did field goals in the half, putting  pressure on them to score out of the break. 

Redshirt junior center Connor Clifford, who scored all nine of his points in the second half, recorded seven of them in the first 3:42 after the intermission to key an 11-2 run by the Cougs to pull back within two of Stanford at 37-35. The Cardinal, however, responded with a 14-5 scoring advantage to go up again by double digits at 51-40 after a pair of free throws from Rosco Allen. 

The Cardinal then shot just 2-for-11 from the field over the next 3:58 to allow WSU a chance to respond with a scoring run of its own, but the Cougs were only able to hit two field goals of their own while going 0-for-4 from the foul line during that stretch.  

After the teams traded baskets to make the score 61-51, WSU went on another three-minute cold stretch in which it did not score while Stanford closed the game knocking down its final seven shots to ease away from the Cougs. 

“These losses have shown me the type of personnel I need to bring through the door to stay connected to the conference,” Kent said of the losing streak. “I don’t look at it as a losing streak. I try to find those individual improvements and miniature accomplishments as Junior (Longrus) and Brett (Boese) are leaving. The guys who are coming back and have endured this- that’s some toughness they’ll have next year.” 

Humphrey led all scorers with 26 points and 10 rebounds while Allen and Pickens combined for 14 points apiece for the Cardinal. Hawkinson finished the game with another double-double of 17 points and 12 boards to earn game MVP honors for the Cougars.  

WSU will try to win its final home game on senior day for forwards Longrus and Boese against the California Golden Bears (18-8, 8-5), Sunday. The game is slated to tip-off at 5 p.m. with ESPNU picking up the coverage.