The LadyCats survived the running of the Bulls today, holding a team averaging 78 points a game to only 49 points, the 11th time this season Nova has held an opponent under 50. Devon Kane deposited three foul shots with only 0.3 seconds left on the clock and a heave from the backcourt went well wide to give Nova the closely contested win in a poorly officiated game.
Nova started out strong, with SFU having to call a time out not three minutes in, trailing 7-0 on a Rachel Roberts three and two Laura Sweeney layups. The Cats continued strong, pulling down a ton of rebounds off SFU misses. Taylor Holeman had five boards in the first five minutes of the game and Sweeney finished the half with 10 boards. Two three pointers by Lauren Burford, a Roberts layup and a short shot by Caroline Coyer pushed the Nova lead out to 17-7 at the 11:15 mark.
From that point on, the first half belonged to Andrell Smith, scoring 12 of SFU's points in a 16-5 run to close out the half to lead Nova by 1 at 23-22. SFU came at Nova with a full court press after each made basket and Nova coughed up the ball a few times on bad passes and Nova did not score their 18th and 19th points until only 1 minute remained in the half. With incredible team speed, SFU was scoring points only seconds after grabbing defensive rebounds at the other end, or off turnovers. Roberts paced the first half scoring with 8, Burford 6 and Sweeey 4.
The second half started with a barrage of fouls, SFU picking up their sixth team foul at the 15:37 mark. At that point Sweeney went to work from the left corner from a spread formation, continuing to drive her defender to the hoop, generating points or fouls. SFU was not offering any help to her defender and she pretty much had her way. After being behind by as much as 5 at the 17 minute mark, Nova caught up to SFU at 33 with 12 minutes to go on a short Kane bank shot and their first lead in the second half 17 seconds later on a Kane free throw. The game was then nip and tuck the balance of the game with Nova never able to get more than 4 points ahead and SFU never able to get better than a tie score.
In a key sequence, Andrell Smith (20 points on the night) picked up her 4th personal on an offensive foul with 5:18 to go and Caroline Coyer attacked her on offense and fouled her out just over a minute later on a drive to the basket. An SFU three pointer tied the score at 47 with 3:15 to go, and no one was able to score again until Sweeney knocked down two clutch free throws with 1:12 to go. SFU immediatley responded with a layup to knot the game again at 49 with 53 seconds left. With 36 seconds left Holeman overthrew a pass to Sweeney on a perfectly executed pick and roll, turning the ball over to SFU. After using most of the 30 second shot clock, a short SFU shot was corralled by Holeman, who kicked the ball out to Roberts on the right side. A long pass down the right sideline forced Kane to come to the sideline, catch the ball with her back to the basket, turn and heave a no-chance shot up just before the buzzer as an SFU player bumped hard into her. The contact was enough to warrent the foul call and Kane then calmly sank the first two shots to get a 51-49 lead. After a time out by Nova to set the defense for the final 0.3 seconds, Kane nailed the third free throw, SFU got the ball to their 3 point shooter at just outside the half-court line but her shot had no chance. Happiness Reigns!
Once again Nova managed to find a way to win without shooting espcially well and going through a long scoring drought (ten minutes, 50 seconds). The defense performed well enough to get back and thwart most attempts by SFU to run us out of the building. SFU's shooting was even worse than ours (17 of 65 vs 16 of 49 for Nova). Sweeney led Nova with 16 points and 11 boards and really controlled the tempo of the game for most of the second half, except when she sat down for a bit with her fourth foul. Roberts tacked on 13, Burford and Kane 6 apiece. Nova won the board battle 44-41, with Holeman finishing with 9.
Outstanding Efforts - Holeman and Sweeney controlling the boards for the entire first half. Kane coming through with the game winning free throws for the second game in a row. Another overall good defensive effort, keeping a speedy,high scoring team in check (29 points below their average). Sweeney moving up to 9th place on the all time scoring list with 1,336. Next up on the list is current Drexel coach Denise Dillon with 1,355. Her 701 career rebounds puts her only 2 behind Jackie Adamshick (who played in the alumni game this afternoon) for 7th place on that career list.
The "need to improve on" column - plenty of opportunities to knock down threes again today and not much success ( 5 of 23), only one in the second hafl), some shots far off the mark. If teams start really backing down in the lane or zoning us, the three point shooters need to produce. We have managed to get through four Big East wins without needing a lot of threes, but this can't continue. If we simply shot 33% on our threes over the past 7 or eight games we would have blown everyone away, and had Delaware in a tight game at the end.
The Future - With Syracuse losing today and Notre Dame and St. Johns facing off tomorrow, only one team other than Nova will remain undefeated in the Big East. Nova is now 15-2 on the season and 4-0 in the Big East. Both represent the fastest starts for the team since 1986-87. We head up to Providence on Wedensday night - hopefully no one will be looking past them to a big game against Syracuse at 6 p.m. next Saturday night at the Pavilion. Two more wins may very well set us up with an unbeaten record in the Big East and a Top 25 ranking before we head up to face UConn the following week. Come on out and support this team! Admission is free to anyone with a ticket stub from the men's game against Syracuse that morning.
Added link to PhilaHoopsW storyline 1-20-13
This post was edited on 1/20 8:04 AM by tpenter
Mel Greenberg storyline
Nova started out strong, with SFU having to call a time out not three minutes in, trailing 7-0 on a Rachel Roberts three and two Laura Sweeney layups. The Cats continued strong, pulling down a ton of rebounds off SFU misses. Taylor Holeman had five boards in the first five minutes of the game and Sweeney finished the half with 10 boards. Two three pointers by Lauren Burford, a Roberts layup and a short shot by Caroline Coyer pushed the Nova lead out to 17-7 at the 11:15 mark.
From that point on, the first half belonged to Andrell Smith, scoring 12 of SFU's points in a 16-5 run to close out the half to lead Nova by 1 at 23-22. SFU came at Nova with a full court press after each made basket and Nova coughed up the ball a few times on bad passes and Nova did not score their 18th and 19th points until only 1 minute remained in the half. With incredible team speed, SFU was scoring points only seconds after grabbing defensive rebounds at the other end, or off turnovers. Roberts paced the first half scoring with 8, Burford 6 and Sweeey 4.
The second half started with a barrage of fouls, SFU picking up their sixth team foul at the 15:37 mark. At that point Sweeney went to work from the left corner from a spread formation, continuing to drive her defender to the hoop, generating points or fouls. SFU was not offering any help to her defender and she pretty much had her way. After being behind by as much as 5 at the 17 minute mark, Nova caught up to SFU at 33 with 12 minutes to go on a short Kane bank shot and their first lead in the second half 17 seconds later on a Kane free throw. The game was then nip and tuck the balance of the game with Nova never able to get more than 4 points ahead and SFU never able to get better than a tie score.
In a key sequence, Andrell Smith (20 points on the night) picked up her 4th personal on an offensive foul with 5:18 to go and Caroline Coyer attacked her on offense and fouled her out just over a minute later on a drive to the basket. An SFU three pointer tied the score at 47 with 3:15 to go, and no one was able to score again until Sweeney knocked down two clutch free throws with 1:12 to go. SFU immediatley responded with a layup to knot the game again at 49 with 53 seconds left. With 36 seconds left Holeman overthrew a pass to Sweeney on a perfectly executed pick and roll, turning the ball over to SFU. After using most of the 30 second shot clock, a short SFU shot was corralled by Holeman, who kicked the ball out to Roberts on the right side. A long pass down the right sideline forced Kane to come to the sideline, catch the ball with her back to the basket, turn and heave a no-chance shot up just before the buzzer as an SFU player bumped hard into her. The contact was enough to warrent the foul call and Kane then calmly sank the first two shots to get a 51-49 lead. After a time out by Nova to set the defense for the final 0.3 seconds, Kane nailed the third free throw, SFU got the ball to their 3 point shooter at just outside the half-court line but her shot had no chance. Happiness Reigns!
Once again Nova managed to find a way to win without shooting espcially well and going through a long scoring drought (ten minutes, 50 seconds). The defense performed well enough to get back and thwart most attempts by SFU to run us out of the building. SFU's shooting was even worse than ours (17 of 65 vs 16 of 49 for Nova). Sweeney led Nova with 16 points and 11 boards and really controlled the tempo of the game for most of the second half, except when she sat down for a bit with her fourth foul. Roberts tacked on 13, Burford and Kane 6 apiece. Nova won the board battle 44-41, with Holeman finishing with 9.
Outstanding Efforts - Holeman and Sweeney controlling the boards for the entire first half. Kane coming through with the game winning free throws for the second game in a row. Another overall good defensive effort, keeping a speedy,high scoring team in check (29 points below their average). Sweeney moving up to 9th place on the all time scoring list with 1,336. Next up on the list is current Drexel coach Denise Dillon with 1,355. Her 701 career rebounds puts her only 2 behind Jackie Adamshick (who played in the alumni game this afternoon) for 7th place on that career list.
The "need to improve on" column - plenty of opportunities to knock down threes again today and not much success ( 5 of 23), only one in the second hafl), some shots far off the mark. If teams start really backing down in the lane or zoning us, the three point shooters need to produce. We have managed to get through four Big East wins without needing a lot of threes, but this can't continue. If we simply shot 33% on our threes over the past 7 or eight games we would have blown everyone away, and had Delaware in a tight game at the end.
The Future - With Syracuse losing today and Notre Dame and St. Johns facing off tomorrow, only one team other than Nova will remain undefeated in the Big East. Nova is now 15-2 on the season and 4-0 in the Big East. Both represent the fastest starts for the team since 1986-87. We head up to Providence on Wedensday night - hopefully no one will be looking past them to a big game against Syracuse at 6 p.m. next Saturday night at the Pavilion. Two more wins may very well set us up with an unbeaten record in the Big East and a Top 25 ranking before we head up to face UConn the following week. Come on out and support this team! Admission is free to anyone with a ticket stub from the men's game against Syracuse that morning.
Added link to PhilaHoopsW storyline 1-20-13
This post was edited on 1/20 8:04 AM by tpenter
Mel Greenberg storyline