#11 Louisville 55, Villanova 49

[TC Romulus]

The lineup on the floor for the first 7 minutes of the second half, when Villanova outscored Louisville 13-10, was Sweeney, Leer, K. Coyer, Carey and Roberts/Kane.

Emily Leer hit a jumper with 9:34 left in the game to give Villanova a 42-40 lead. That was Nova's last lead in the game. Leer was frequently open behind the three point line in the second half, but her teammates didn't pass her the ball. Leer attempted no three-pointers in the game. For a team that has difficulty scoring, that doesn't seem to me like good strategy.

Harry took Leer out with 4:54 left in the game and Villanova down 2 and didn't put her back in the game until 43 seconds left.
After Leer left the game with 4:54 left, Nova only scored 6 points the rest of the game, and 4 of those points were after there were only 21 seconds left.

I thought the Villanova offense was out of whack at the end of the game. They kept forcing the ball to Roberts even though she wasn't playing well offensively. In the last 3 minutes, Roberts missed 3 layups and 1 three-pointer.

If Roberts is not playing well offensively, and Burford is on the bench the whole second half, and C. Coyer is injured, I don't think you can afford to take Leer out of the game at the 4:54 mark, because you don't have enough offensive options.

Harry seemed to take Leer out and put Pearson in because presumably he thought Pearson was a better defensive option versus Louisville's Bria Smith. Also, Pearson had 8 rebounds in the game. While Smith didn't score again until 6 seconds left, Louisville got points from other players, and Nova had great difficulty scoring.

Why couldn't Villanova have played the last 4:54 with Sweeney, Leer, Pearson, K. Coyer and Kane/Roberts/Carey on the court?

I'm glad Villanova hung in there with #11 Louisville, especially after Louisville was up 12 points in the first half. However, USF beat Louisville by 11 in Louisville four days ago, and we beat USF.

I thought the best thing about the game was K. Coyer: 12 points, 5 rebounds, 32 minutes.

 

[TC Romulus]

The most controversial play of the game was the seemingly flagrant foul against Devon Kane.

Villanova, I think, was up by 2 points, and Devon Kane looked like she was going to rush up court for an uncontested layup, but instead, she was clotheslined at midcourt by the Louisville player.

Why Villanova at this point didn't get some free throws plus possession, I have no idea. The crowd was outraged, as was Harry.

Villanova was never able to get their lead to more than 2 points.

I thought that, in the second half, Villanova had all the momentum, and Louisville looked tired, and Louisville wasn't scoring inside anymore, but unfortunately, Villanova missed a lot of free throws that would have built their lead.

 

[UncleBill57]

We could have won had we made our free throws. The non clothesline call was outrageous. We missed some layups too. We never give up. I thought Leer needed more time in there at the end as well.

 

[tpenter]

Yeah, all in all a completely disappointing loss. We had everything going for us in this contest and still couldn't get a win. Looville probably lost their senior power forward for the season last week with her second knee injury. Their star player left the game with seven minutes to go in the first half and couldn't return. We had their remaining bigs in foul trouble in both halves, shooting the bonus for more than seven minutes of both halves.

Last year we had them in the same position with foul trouble and I blamed the coaching for not attacking the basket to get foul shots, layups and some players fouled out. I thought Harry was going the same route this year, but he sent Devon in several times in the first half and went right at them them entire second half. Missing all of those layups and foul shots (including two front ends of 1 and 1 opportunities) was telling of a team that might not be ready for the prime time. Can't blame the offensive philosophy for going to the rim that they were giving to us instead of throwing up threes, but the players need to finish. I might have rotated Holeman in there in the second half to keep fresh players going up against their short-handed fromt line.

We are still in Charlie Creme's NCAA bracketology, but check out his comment this week - "A win Sunday over Louisville would have really helped the Wildcats feel more secure. Despite some good RPI numbers, Villanova shouldn't feel entirely safe without another good win." Where is that "good win" going to come from? The Louisville game did not leave me with a good feeling. Nonetheless he has us as a 10 seed playing Michigan State in Durham, where (you guessed it), if we win we play Duke on their home court! We should be so lucky.

A tough match-up for us against St. Johns at home on Wednesday and a visit to Syracuse on Saturday keep the heat on.