NEW YORK -- Chasson Randle came into the NIT semifinals 11 points away from setting Stanford's all-time scoring record. The Cardinal needed much more than that from their senior star after blowing a 21-point first-half lead.
Randle played through foul trouble to score 24 points Tuesday and carry Stanford past Old Dominion 67-60 with some big second-half shots.
Randle passed Todd Lichti and has 2,350 points for his career.
"He's a winner," coach Johnny Dawkins said. "He's shown that through his career here."
The Cardinal (23-13) led 15-0 when Old Dominion finally scored its first points nearly five minutes in and were up 25-4 midway through the first half. But the deficit was just six at halftime after Richard Ross' dunk with six seconds left.
Old Dominion (27-8) took its first lead on Ross' layup with just over 11 minutes left. But a steal and a dunk in transition by Marcus Allen with less than eight minutes to go put Stanford up for good, and Randle then hit two straight 3-pointers.
After Trey Freeman missed a potential tying jumper with 87 seconds to go, Randle's floater put Stanford up 63-59. His two free throws with 44.3 seconds left stretched the lead to six.
Randle picked up his fourth foul midway through the second half, but spent less than two minutes on the bench after that.
The Cardinal face Miami in Thursday's NIT championship game.
The Monarchs started pressing to get back in it, forcing 10 first-half turnovers to overcome some horrendous shooting. At the half, Old Dominion had missed all nine of its 3-point attempts, and its two leading scorers, Freeman and Aaron Bacote, were scoreless on combined 0-for-13 shooting.
"We were able to come up with a couple steals and convert points off turnovers, so that was good, kind of got our crowd into it and gave us a little bit of life," coach Jeff Jones said.
Ross scored 15 points off the bench, going 7 of 7 from the floor. Another reserve, Ambrose Mosley, led Old Dominion with 16 points.
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NOTES: Stanford and Old Dominion were meeting for the second time. The Cardinal also won 84-60 on Nov. 23, 2000 in the opening round of the Puerto Rico Shootout … Stanford was playing a game on March 31 for the first time in school history. Thursday's game will be the 37th of the season, matching the school record established in 2012 … Stanford is making its third trip to Madison Square Garden in four seasons and has compiled a 14-4 record at the famed arena … The Cardinal is 17-5 in eight NIT appearances … Senior tri-captains Anthony Brown, Stefan Nastic and Chasson Randle combined to shoot 21-26 from the foul line. The trio has combined to make 446-545 (81.8 percent) this season … Chasson Randle notched his 16th 20-point game of the season and 42nd of his career. Of Randle's 2,350 career points, 150 have come on Tuesday, 1,079 have come in the first half and 543 have come in March … Chasson Randle also made three three-pointers, giving him 301 for his career … Anthony Brown had made 23 consecutive free throws dating back to Feb. 26 before missing in the second half … In five career games at Madison Square Garden, Anthony Brown is shooting 9-18 (50.0 percent) from beyond the arc … Reid Travis grabbed eight rebounds in 30 minutes off the bench … Old Dominion attempted 61 shots compared to Stanford's 39.
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Stanford Head Coach Johnny Dawkins
“After we lost the lead, I thought we played 10 beautiful minutes of basketball, maybe the best 10 minutes we have in any first half this season. And then I thought we didn't finish the half as well as we should have, so I talked to them about that. I thought there were some specific things we didn't do as well. I thought one was on the board. I didn't think we rebounded as well. They had a number of offensive rebounds.”
“I thought our communication defensively lapsed. We turned it over too much. We had 10 turnovers in the first half, and we pretty much average 10 turnovers for a game. So that's very uncharacteristic. We had to clean those things up. And I told our guys, look, we still have the lead, even though we have not played our best 10 minutes of basketball, let's go back and turn it around when we start the next half.”
“You know, it's a heck of an honor for Chasson to become the all time leading scorer in Stanford history. To do it at Madison Square Garden I think it would be he'll always remember it for the rest of his life anyway; but having done it at the Garden in front of a terrific crowd and on this stage, I think it means that much more to him. And to his teammates, too. The best thing I could see is when we went to the locker room and we were celebrating the win, and we talked about him breaking the record. Just all of the teammates jumped up and hugging him; it was great to see that type of emotion, that kind of shared experience, because they all are a part of it and it just made it really, really neat to see the young guys celebrate like that.”
Stanford Senior Chasson Randle
“You know, it's a great honor just to be able to have my name behind it. But at the same time, it's not just me who helped get myself in there. A lot of my teammates, family, coaches, everybody, helped me get there, starting at Rock Island. And once I got to Stanford, I had a lot of help here every single day. I had Coach pushing me, telling me that you practice how you play, and making sure that I was getting after it there and then. My teammates encouraged me every single day. They helped me out a lot.”
“They say this is the world's most famous arena, and I believe it. You walk in here and you see what's happening in the rafters and you're kind of in awe. It's a great honor to be able to do it, but with the group of guys; we had no quit in us. You see that when things weren't working well for us today, we persevered and kept fighting.”
Old Dominion Head Coach Jeff Jones
“Our energy level just went up. Our start, unfortunately, was reminiscent of some other slow starts we've had this year on the road or on neutral sites. I think it was compounded by the fact that Stanford came out red hot. Brown hit three threes that were NBA threes, and it wasn't necessarily bad defense.”
“What changed was we started attacking and got them out of the rhythm that they were in. We played with more emotion. And ultimately, gosh, I'm so proud of these guys. Been a terrific ride this year. I thought maybe we could deal another one or two. Absolutely can't fault the effort at all. But ultimately, you've got to put the ball in the basket and we didn't do that well enough.”
“We went to the pressure and that was as much to get us going as anything else. We were able to come up with a couple steals and convert points off turnovers, so that was good, kind of got our crowd into it and gave us a little bit of life. We are not accustomed to pressing for a long period of time, so we couldn't stay with it for an extended period. But it served I think a purpose of allowing us to get the back in the game.”
