(03-26-2019, 01:30 AM)CompSci87 Wrote: Stanford's next opponent will be the Missouri State Lady Bears. Shannon Coffee take note! More Bears to conquer!
Love it CompSci! And thanks for your summary, as always, 81! I felt like this was a variation on a lot of our games this season - each of Williams (early in the 1Q), Carrington (2Q) and Smith (second half) carried the team offensively, but otherwise no one really broke out in terms of scoring. Maya continues to struggle finishing her layups - they always seem like they just need slightly more OOMPH. She doesn't look weak either, so it has to be something about not knowing quite where she is in relation to the basket.
I was lucky enough to have second row seats and the team looked very nervous at the start - they did not have their usual confidence in their eyes, and it really showed. I was not at all surprised that we fell behind, but what I could understand was why we kept chucking up lower percentage threes in the first 10-15 seconds of a possession. Lacie, in particular, was something like 0-8 from the arc - at some point, recognize that you need to try something different! We also seemed really slow underneath the basket - I can't remember seeing so many balls drop without a single tree in sight trying to collect them. At the end of the 1Q, they were outrebounding us and our 3PT shooting percentage was .09 - yes - 9%. Egads. We didn't ever panic, but we definitely seemed nervous and not like ourselves.
Thank goodness Carrington came to the rescue with those treys in the second quarter. That got both the crowd going and the team. And as much as I can't believe I'm saying it, I think Missy was (unintentionally) more of a force for good than for evil, because when she called that ridiculous charge on Carrington, it go the crowd in a total freaking uproar - nothing like an otherwise polite bunch of octogenarians all yelling BOOOOOO at the top of their lungs for thirty seconds straight. (Most of the fans around us were very polite grandparent types and we often found ourselves starting the cheers for lack of anyone else doing so, but even they were willing to hop up and down and start screaming when Missy would abuse her whistle!)
After that it felt like we played with more fire, and when the team came out after the half, Williams, Carrington, and Smith were all knowingly eyeing each other like "we got this" and, sure enough, they did. The different in the confidence they exuded was night and day compared to the first half.
Honestly, I was pretty discouraged by our underclassmen not named Williams (does she even count as one at this point)? Dodson wasn't doing a very good job boxing out on rebounds and, as I said, was short on her layups. Both Hulls didn't seem quite as good on defense as they usually did, and they combined for 1-11 from long range. If you take them out, our team otherwise went 11-24 (45.8%), which is well above our average 3PT shooting percentage. My friend who'd never seen our women's team this year was like, "get those Hull sisters off the floor or else stop giving them the ball!" I've liked a lot of what the Hulls have done in other games, which makes me think it must have been in part freshman nerves. That said, wow, Gonzales - I couldn't believe she was a freshman given how poised she is!
However, Wilson was a revelation. She was kept out of the first half because Missy tagged her with a ridiculous second foul early in the first quarter, but in the second half she was the primary guard on Gonzales and it was night and day and how much BYU's offense was neutralized. Just as Wilson was the one who smothered Ionescu in the PAC-12 finals, so she did with Gonzales here. I love her tenacious defense, and I think that coupled with Smith finally connecting on a few treys is what blew it open for us. As good and important as our big three were, I think Wilson is the one who got us a double digit lead through her stellar defense. (And crazy as it is, this is the first time she's not been injured during March Madness, so she's getting to play in the tournament for the first time
this year).
I like the team's attitude going forward, as exemplified by Carrington during the press conference: the sky is the limit for our team - we have so much we can still improve on. We missed, what was it, like, a ton of threes (motions to Tara) - - 23 treys ("Oh wow") -- yeah, so we have so much more we can do better. On an off shooting night overall, I'll take that attitude going into our next game, and hope it improves our shooting at the line, too, which was, wow, not inspiring if the game had been down to a single possession.
All in all, an enjoyable game to see in person - close first half, enough of a lead in the second to relax and enjoy it, some fun plays from most of our starters, and a very respectable opponent. I'll take it!
