Nova falls flat 56-41

[tpenter]

Princeton's defense totally stymied Nova's offense and the final score did not do justice to how complete the job was as Nova scored the last eight points to cut the final deficit to 15.

The first half was filled with turnovers, missed shots and turnovers by both teams, punctuated by some bizzare referee calls and non-calls. The first half score was 20-17 and not much more needs to be said.

Princeton came out in the second half by pushing the ball inside and quickly extended the lead to double figures and Nova had no answer offensively. Nineteen turnovers against the press and extended defense, 3 of 21 three point shooting,lots of fouls and coming up empty on most loose balls and rebounds doomed the Cats to a very lackluster shellacking.

Bright spots? Not many. Emily Leer got offensive in the second half to post a 12 point game as an early career high and Emily Suhey shot 2 for 2 and grabbed a few rebounds to finally look comfortable in a game for some time. A loss today would not have been unexpected. Disappointing that we were not even competitive today.

Della-Ware in town on Tuesday for the home opener and a celebration of Harry's 600th win. Della Donne looked unstoppable scoring 40 against a good Penn State team this week, but her team looked beatable if we play with the defensive intensity of the first three games. An effort like today will put us on the mat early on.

 

[ace]

I'm thinking that Elena alone could beat us.
Tuesday she may crack fifty.

 

[tpenter]

That she may. That being said, her 40 against Penn State may not have been a win if PSU had shot the ball half decent. Although Delaware has added some better players this year and is using Acker well coming off of the bench, they still had trouble getting the ball to EDD and went some long streches without scoring. Most of the offense came about from her coming out to the point and taking the ball and dealing from there. If she has a bad game, the team is beatable. Then again, if we play like we did today even that wouldn't matter.

 

[needatobaby]

Thanks for the reports. I don't make it to all the games but I do read the box scores. Big stat for us is assist to turnover ration. Generally we always did well when it was close to 2. With our offense we cannot afford quick points off turnovers. The BE is well awrae of that. The opposie is when we do control the tempo we drive them nuts. My thought are we do not develop a point guard attitude on the floor. A team need that type of leadership. Nuff said. Hope to make game tomorrow.

 

[ccoyer]

Growing pains. The team has to learn what it takes to focus and win each game while they're is transitioning to a new style of play.

Turnovers have been low until this game. I'm hoping to see them return to that on tuesday against a UD team with mediocre guard play and defense.