Cameron Brink has had a storied career at Stanford. She’s won a national title, been named Pac-12 Player of the Year twice and is the three-time Pac-12 Defensive Player of the Year. She also was last season’s WBCA Defensive Player of the Year. This season, she should sweep all national Defensive Player of the Year honors.
Defense is hard to quantify. So many things are a factor. On offense, you can just look at points and, although that also has its flaws, it steers you in the right direction regarding who is the most impactful player offensively. Defensively, you can’t just go with blocks and steals. You have to watch the game and see how the team operates as a unit defensively and understand players’ roles.
At Stanford, Brink is the anchor. She’s the nucleus. She is the center of the universe that the entire team focuses on and funnels opposing players to. Stanford relies on Brink to clean up messes and wreak havoc on their opponents. Watching Brink on defense, you start to wonder: Who is more threatening? Is it the offense trying to score? Or, is it Brink stopping it from happening?
Blocks aren’t the end all be all defensively, but Brink runs the block party in college basketball, averaging 3.5 per game. These blocks are a testament to her rim protection,…
