Senior guard Drew Shiller might have put it best when he said, “We haven’t won on the road, and a good team goes out and wins on the road. We haven’t accomplished anything yet when all we’ve done is win at home.”

So, as Stanford hits the road for the longest stretch of its season – four games – the team looks to accomplish something. Victory, that is. The Cardinal (10-9, 4-3 Pac-10) will spend the weekend in Arizona, meeting the Wildcats (10-9, 4-3) today and Arizona State (14-6, 4-3) on Saturday.

Stanford and both opponents are part of a five-way tie for second in the conference, so the significance of these games won’t go unnoticed.

“The opportunity is there, and if we go out and compete every game like we do at home, we’ll have a pretty good chance to win,” Shiller said. “With four road games coming up here, and Arizona is obviously tied with us right now, it’s a huge game, we just have to put our best foot forward.”

“We just have to start playing better on the road,” he added.

Head coach Johnny Dawkins agreed with his co-captain, but emphasized that opportunity comes one game at a time.

“I look at it as an opportunity,” Dawkins said. “If we want to do anything special, we have to go out and prove that we can win on the road. So, [it’s important] for our kids to understand the importance of each one of these games, take them one at a time, just give our best effort. We’re starting to grow up, we’re starting to mature in a lot of ways, and I think we’ll really see it [in] the way we compete on the road, so we’re excited about this trip and the opportunity we have.”

In a season riddled with injury, growing up has already been important for the young Stanford team. Most recently, sophomore Jack Trotter slid into a role in the post left wide-open by the loss of junior Josh Owens and injured sophomore Andrew Zimmermann.

“I think you have to give [Trotter] a lot of credit,” Dawkins said. “We needed guys to contribute more than they thought their roles would probably be, and he’s one of the guys that had to do that especially… I’m very proud of him.”

Arizona, though, has experienced a similar growth spurt to get to 4-3. The Wildcats have only one senior in guard Nic Wise and one junior in forward Jamelle Horne, making the roster among the youngest in the country. Wise uses his experience well, averaging 15.3 points per game, 1.84 steals and nearly 4 assists per game, and Horne consistently adds another 11.2 points and 6.5 rebounds to Arizona outings.

But, the Wildcats are led by one of their youngest talents: freshman forward Derrick Williams heads the team in scoring (15.6) and boards (7.1), and boasts the conference’s second-best shooting percentage at 58.9 percent.

Dawkins knows that Williams, and the whole Arizona roster, will be a challenging opponent for the Cardinal.

“I think Arizona is playing well…and Derrick’s a terrific player,” he noted. “Both teams are young, but I think both teams at this stage in the game are a little older than their age. We’re almost halfway through the Pac-10 season and more than halfway through the season, and I’ve told some of our kids, ‘You’re no longer freshmen and sophomores anymore, you’re more like sophomores and juniors. You’ve gained a lot of experience this year, and it’s time to play like you’ve gained that experience.’”

With Williams in the paint, Trotter will need to continue to fill the big shoes that have been left for him. But, the sophomore says his confidence is “on the upswing.”

“When you play against a senior like Schaftenaar [of Oregon State] or such a highly touted recruit like Dunigan [of Oregon], and you can hold your own, it’s definitely a confidence booster,” Trotter said.

Trotter should be confident with the conference’s second-best scorer and rebounder in Landry Fields (21.8 points, 8.7 boards) and standout shooter Jeremy Green (17.5 points) on the court to boost the Cardinal, even when the sophomore can’t.

But, Tucson contains the Pac-10’s biggest arena, with an average attendance of nearly 10,000, which may take Stanford’s struggles on the road to a whole new level.

“It’s a terrific environment,” Dawkins said. “It’s a great place, the crowd has a lot of energy, and we expect that. We’ve been in a few venues that have been that way, where it has been that crowds and unbelievable support, and [that’s] something that we have to continue to face.

“When you go on the road, you have to be consistent with your effort and with your execution for 40 minutes,” he continued. “Going anywhere on the road is tough, so you have to approach it that way. You have to be poised, you have to value the ball and, probably above all else, you have to really defend well.”

Shiller agreed, and said the Cardinal was focused on the little things in order to improve its record on the road.

“The biggest thing is communication, especially on the defensive end,” Shiller said. “Being on the road, it is tough to play in other environments, especially at Arizona, so we’re looking forward to the challenge. If we can do well on this road trip [it] can definitely spring us forward. So, it’s definitely important.”

The trip is indeed important for Stanford, potentially making or breaking its success in conference play. ‘The challenge’ tips off at 5 p.m. on Thursday, and all eyes are on the Cardinal to see how it fares.