Three questions ahead of Saturday's matchup with Stanford

BOULDER — The No. 24 Colorado Buffaloes will host the Stanford Cardinal Saturday afternoon in Boulder.

The Buffs come into the matchup trying to finish a weekend sweep of the Pac-12’s Northern California schools. A win would give Colorado (18-5, 7-3) a minimum of a shared seat atop the Pac-12 heading into Oregon next weekend.

Here’s what we’re wondering:

What is Stanford?

This is the big one.

Nobody really knows if Stanford is good at basketball. Sure, they started the season 4-0 and sat alone atop the Pac-12 standings. Since then, they’ve lost four of five games, including Thursday at Utah.

But the lone win in that stretch was by 10 points over then-No. 14 Oregon.

And two of the losses went to overtime.

So is Stanford good? It’s kind of tough to say.

What we know is that the duo of junior forward Oscar da Silva and freshman point guard Tyrell Terry form one of the most deadly pick-and-roll combos in the conference. They’re combining for over 30 points per game. (It’s worth noting that Terry hails from Minneapolis, as does Buffs point guard McKinley Wright IV.)

Outside of that duo, the scoring is much tougher to project.

Freshman forward Spencer Jones is the Cardinal’s top 3-point threat, but he’s only made five of his last 20 attempts from deep, over the last four games. He’s scoring less than five points per game while playing 31 minutes per game during that stretch.

That’s the sort of streakiness that has plagued Stanford this season, and also makes it tough to project what exactly Colorado is going up against on Saturday.

Will the Buffs be the Buffs?

Colorado wasn’t itself against Cal. Luckily, the Buffs are talented enough to win basketball games even when they aren’t at their best.

They realize things didn’t go the way they should have though.

“It’s a sign of a good team to have a somber locker room after a conference win,” Tad Boyle said after the game. “It’s a sign of the expectation level we have as a team.”

Now they need to fix it.

Colorado can’t give up over 55% shooting from the field again, and they definitely need to make more than 66% of their free throws. Essentially, they just need to get back to what they’ve been for most of the last couple of months.

This isn’t the first time the Buffs have faltered in the first half of a weekend and, typically, they’ve been able to bounce back quickly.

We’ll see if they can turn things around on Saturday.

How will the big men play?

Star forward Tyler Bey was outstanding against Cal on Thursday, scoring 21 points on 14 shots while pillong in 10 rebounds.

Unfortunately, he was about the only one.

Lucas Siewert, Evan Battey and Alexander Strating shared the rest of the frontcourt minutes and combined for just five points and eight boards. That needs to change.

Siewert played his worst game of his otherwise outstanding senior season, and Boyle said after the game there’s no reason for concern.

Battey found himself in foul trouble, a theme throughout his career, and was frustrated by some tough calls that went against him.

Strating only played six minutes, his first appearance on the court in two weeks.

Notably absent from the rotation was Dallas Walton, who is still recovering from his third ACL surgery. Boyle said he plans to use Walton based on the matchups his team faces, but don’t be surprised if his number is called to kickstart the Colorado frontcourt against Stanford.

The No. 24 Colorado Buffaloes will host the Stanford Cardinal at the CU Events Center, Satruday at 4 p.m. The game will be broadcast nationally on the Pac-12 Networks.