Stanford's Cold Shooting Night Dooms Them Against Georgia Tech

It was a cold night inside McCamish Pavilion, at least for the Stanford shooters. The team collectively shot 30.3% from the field and just 18.5% from three in their 60-52 loss to Georgia Tech on the road. The defeat drops Stanford to 16-9 on the season and 8-6 in the ACC.

After rattling off four straight wins against ACC opponents, Stanford has now dropped three of four, with two losses on the road, while splitting the remaining two home games. This recent stretch may not have completely eliminated the Cardinal from NCAA tournament contention, but the path there isn't going to get much easier, with a matchup against No. 3 Duke looming on Saturday afternoon.

Duke just beat Cal 78-57 on Wednesday night.

As for the game against Georgia Tech, part of the drop-off in shooting was due to an uncharacteristic night from star forward Maxime Raynaud, who finished with eight points and six rebounds in 33 minutes. Raynaud leads the nation in double-doubles with 20, but on Wednesday he was held without a single double on his score sheet.

His eight points matches a season low, tying the eight he put up against Florida State at the end of January. It's just the second time this season that he hasn't scored in double figures. Raynaud had recorded at least ten rebounds in ten straight games, but that streak was also snapped in Georgia.

This is just the fourth game this season where he hasn't reached double figures in rebounds, and Stanford is 1-3 in those contests, with the lone win coming in a shootout at Cal in early December.

Wednesday's loss was the first time that he didn't record double digits in at least one of those two categories.

Outside of the 27.3% shooting night he had in the second game of the season in a blowout win against CSUF, this was Raynaud's worst shooting night of the year at 30.6%.

Coincidentally, this was also just the second time that Raynaud has played 33 minutes this season, with the other time being his worst shooting performance. WIth two points starting to form a line, Kyle Smith and his nerd ball team will have to make sure that he doesn't play exactly 33 minutes again moving forward.

On the bright side, Jaylen Blakes returned to the starting lineup after missing three games and led the way in scoring with 12 points, which included shooting 4-of-4 from the line. He also finished with a game-high six assists, one block, and two steals, filling out the stat sheet in 29 minutes.

The opening minutes in this one were back-and-forth, but Georgia Tech went on a 24-5 run in the first half, and Stanford was never able to close the gap all the way, getting as close as seven late in the game. The Cardinal would allow just 25 points during the entirety of the second half, the lowest total by an opponent in the second half this season.

Stanford returns to the court in Durham, North Carolina to take on the Duke Blue Devils on Saturday. Tip-off is at 1 p.m. (PT) and will air on ABC.