Samuelson is hot as No. 10 Stanford women crush Arizona 73-46

Recommended Video:

Because Karlie Samuelson — like her sisters, former Stanford sharpshooter Bonnie and current UConn star Katie Lou — have excellent shooting range, some people probably think their skill has some sort of genetic component.

So says Stanford head coach Tara VanDerveer, but she’d like to disabuse anybody of that notion. It takes years of dedicated practice, she makes clear.

Karlie Samuelson passed the 200-mark in three-pointers for her career in the No. 10 Cardinal’s 73-46 beatdown of Arizona on Friday night at Maples Pavilion. The senior guard made 4-of-5 from beyond the arc, giving her 201 makes in her career, and scored a game-high 15 points.

She warmed up for the game by hitting a halfcourt shot before the morning shootaround.

The game itself was a laugher. Stanford led 28-6 at the end of the first quarter and 32-12 before Samuelson hit her first three. She also stole an inbounds pass and scored a layup in almost the same motion.

“I was more excited about that than about the threes,” she said.

She entered the game third in the country in three-point shooting at 49 percent and pushed that figure to 51 percent.

“We really came out of the gate fast,” VanDerveer said. “I challenged our team to not have the first quarter be our best quarter.”

But it’s hard to match 80 percent shooting, hitting 12 of 15 shots.

“They’re confident. They play really well at home,” said Arizona’s first-year coach, Adia Barnes. “We knew that, and we really got punched in the face the first few minutes of the game.”

Taking advantage of open looks and height mismatches most of the night, the Cardinal (16-3, 6-1 Pac-12) beat the rebuilding Wildcats (11-7, 2-5) for the 15th straight time. They have won eight of their last nine going into Sunday’s 3 p.m. game against No. 18 Arizona State.

Strangely enough, even though Arizona was called for 20 personal fouls, Stanford had just 10 foul shots. It made just three of them, tying a program low.

Although the Cardinal had 42 points in the paint and a 44-27 rebounding advantage, VanDerveer wasn’t satisfied.

“We had some stretches of great play, and then some stretches of turning it over and not taking as good a shot as we wanted,” she said.

Erica McCall and Brittany McPhee scored 13 points apiece, McPhee getting nine of hers in the first quarter. LaBrittney Jones scored 11 points and Malena Washington 10 to lead Arizona.

Arizona’s six-point first quarter tied its second least productive quarter of the season. The worst was a five-point second quarter the Wildcats endured in a 77-55 loss to Stanford in Tucson on New Year’s Day.

Tom FitzGerald is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: tfitzgerald@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @tomgfitzgerald