I have a confession to make. This whole Stanford sports scene? I’m actually kind of new to it all. I’m a junior, so obviously I’ve been a fan for three years — but before that? Not really. I’m from St. Louis, so believe me when I say that when people talk about “Cardinal Pride” they don’t mean Stanford.

And that’s why I really couldn’t be more excited about Trent Johnson and Co. this year.

Let’s face it, 12 straight Directors Cups are nice and all, but the average sports fan couldn’t care less about how the women’s equestrian synchronized water polo championship race turns out. The only two collegiate sports that truly have the ability to capture people’s attention on a national level are football and men’s basketball. Maybe baseball would have a chance if they got rid of the aluminum bats. I mean the Little League World Series is one thing, but the college game needs to mirror the pros and drop the “More Ping” slogan before anyone takes it seriously as a pastime and not a homerun derby.

Don’t get me wrong; I love that Stanford excels in the lesser known sports of the world. If the NCAA is going to govern competition in something, we should expect nothing less of our University and our student athletes than to shoot for the stars. That they’ve succeeded in their goals only speaks well of them. But the very fact that these sports are less popular means that the competition is somewhat lessened. Not every Division I program in the nation is really killing itself to recruit the next golf or tennis sensation, but everyone’s looking for the next Carmelo Anthony or Reggie Bush.

What I’m getting at is that Stanford’s basketball team this year is something new for all too many Stanford students: a nationally relevant team in a nationally relevant sport. Sure, the Matt Haryasz and Chris Hernandez teams of the past two years were competitive, but they offered nowhere near the upside of the Lopez twins and Anthony Goods.

The Cardinal’s record may not be stellar (11-4, 3-2 Pacific-10 Conference), but their conference is. As others have noted so far this season, the Pac-10 has risen to the level of the best in the nation; even if not all the experts are willing to concede that it is the strongest in the nation, at least it’s in the conversation. Nationally ranked teams abound out West, with UCLA, Oregon and Arizona all in the top 11 of the AP poll.

But the true allure of this particular Stanford team doesn’t lie in its record or the strength of its conference alone. No, as anyone who watched the Cardinal’s most recent three games, the team plays with a scrappy, “Never say die” attitude that has propelled them to big wins over Virginia, Washington and Washington State in recent weeks. And that’s not all Anthony Goods’ doing either. Even those who were perceived as role players are stepping up in a big way, as players like Laurence Hill and Taj Finger have had big moments late in bigger games.

Still, the buzzword of the Cardinal this season is youth. With the twin freshmen big-men, the future of the front court is secure, and the emergence of Goods and the more recent emergence of Hill, who has averaged 15.3 points over Stanford’s recent three game winning streak, gives the team a pair of sophomore difference makers.

It may still be too early in the season to determine just how good the Cardinal will be this year, but it looks as if Stanford has found four starters for the next three years. And that can’t be a bad thing.

In some ways, this is the best time to be a fan. With a bright future and a less-than-dull present, let the Maples mayhem begin. There’s no reason not to enjoy this. A loss hurts — it always does, — but the future prospects of the young team are more than reassuring enough to get even the casual basketball aficionado through a rough game or two. It’s time to sit back, relax, and take note of the future of Stanford basketball.

With a few more wins, the rest of the Pac-10 and even the nation will be too.

Denis Griffin is a junior. Email him at djgriff@stanford.edu.