February 27th, 2018: Rhode Island at Fordham

Just the Facts, Ma'am: Fordham dealt with Rhode Island in the first round of the A-10 tournament, 75-53. G'mrice Davis had 23 points and 16 rebounds to pace Fordham. Elemy Colome's 15 points off the bench led Rhode Island.

For many flocks of Rams, the sound of one hand slapping, holding your teammates accountable, messing with the kid, tripping, clipping, and slick passing, join your intrepid blogger after the jump.

The postseason is upon us! Your intrepid blogger is at Fordham for the first round of the A-10 tournament, as the Rams host... er, the Rams. The ones from Rhode Island, that is.

Protip: do not take buses in the Bronx anytime near rush hour. I didn't get to the game until quarter to seven. (On the plus side, I caught a shiny event Pikachu!)

I'm not used to seeing Bre Cavanaugh's hair this color- she's completely washed out the dye. I think she also freshened up the sides. She looks very sharp.

Fantastic choral anthem. I mean, I should expect Catholic schools to have good choirs, but they were especially good.

It is 41-14 Fordham at halftime. G'mrice Davis already has a double-double with 14 points and 10 rebounds, along with some of the best facial expressions of disbelief I have ever seen. (Jalissa Ross wanted to start something with her, and her reaction was truly something to behold. I missed what Ross said, but it earned her a technical.) The hot passing under the basket has been great for Fordham. We're playing at a speed they can't keep up with.

Well, we gave back more of the lead than I would have liked, but much of that was on the backs of the deep reserves, who are deep reserves for a reason. I think this Fordham team is ready for Richmond, and I don't know if Richmond is ready for them.

We saw Gabrielle Green very briefly in the first half, and she did not nothing of note. Kasey Gagan had a tendency to sneak into games after timeouts, which was very confusing. It's like, c'mon, I already don't know you people from a hole in the wall, don't confuse me like that. Ednaija Lassiter, who was going by a shorter form of her first name that I didn't fully catch from the PA guy, got extended run in the first half, but I don't think we saw her again in the second half. I wasn't impressed with what I saw of her. I'm trying to remember which terrible three-point miss was hers- Rhode Island missed a lot of three-pointers badly.

Laura Perez saw a good amount of time in the second half. I think she was running point, but I won't swear to it; if nothing else, observation has shown that point guards aren't even a thing anymore. Elemy Colome got the second half start in place of Jalissa Ross, possibly so Ross would have a little time to calm down after the shenanigans with G'mrice Davis. She's feisty. She drove hard to the basket. I don't think I like her on defense, though. She seemed awfully fond of playing way too low, going after knees and laying out trips. I realize some of the falls may have been exaggerated for dramatic effect, but there was a particularly blatant one that Lauren Holden suffered that she was trying to play off. Dina Motrechuk got most of her points in the fourth quarter, scoring on our subs. That's not to say anything against her turnaround, mind you. She was physical, and called on for perhaps more time than she was expecting with the foul trouble that Jorgensen got into.

Maia Moffitt's a New Yorker, and she had family at the game, so part of me is glad she got a couple of buckets to go down. She's scrappy on the boards- she chased down a couple of loose balls in impressive fashion. I think she did actually wrestle one away in the first half. Her freshman-ness shows a bit in her offensive positioning. Abby Streeter was the designated three-point shooter- there was one possession where she was wide open in the corner and her teammates managed to miss her. It ended up in a Rhode Island basket anyway, I believe, but I was astonished someone could be so open and be so ignored. Marta Vargas was a playmaker, but only in spurts. I think she was one of the many players from whom G'mrice drew charges.

I have absolutely no idea what got under Jalissa Ross's skin or why she fouled G'mrice so hard and then proceeded to try and stare her down. There may also have been words. I didn't hear them. As mentioned earlier, I was a wee bit distracted by G's facial expressions. I didn't think it was possible to pull off the "don't you make me take my earrings off" look without actually wearing earrings. Ross had a nice block, though I didn't correctly notate who she smooshed, and if this were football I think Moffitt would have gotten half-credit on it. I think we frustrated her by not letting her inside, and she lost her cool. Nicole Jorgensen is a load down low- if she can get the shot up, it's probably going in. She's got a little bit of outside touch, but she seemed to be at her best going to the basket. She had a big block on G'mrice in the third quarter. Foul trouble kept her off the floor a lot, and I don't think that exactly helped the other Rams.

I was impressed with Rhode Island's defensive intensity. They couldn't keep it up all game, and we were able to use some really crisp passing to get ahead of them and get open looks. If they had any ability to shoot from the outside, they might have given us more of a fight, but they just couldn't hit a jumper to save their lives for most of the night.

The deep bench for Fordham is not yet ready for prime time. Nice kids, good hustle, but definitely not ready a nice hustle play on the glass, though. Katie McLoughlin needs to get her to the weight room- she just doesn't have the strength to stop stronger guards from diving on her, and she gets knocked over way too easily. The foul on Kristen Ryan should in no way have been called excessive. Yes, she fell on the opponent, but it was not intentional and it was not unnecessary contact. It wasn't the kind of play that merited serious review with two minutes left in a 25-point game.

I was surpised to see Ralene Kwiatkowski playing alongside Lauren Holden for stretches in the third quarter- usually Ralene subs for Lauren. I don't think either of them was expecting it either, because the offense looked a little ragged with both of them out there. It was adorable to see everyone's reactions when Ralene hit the three, though- she's usually the one running up and down the bench to give out the high-fives. (That responsibility devolved to Kendell Heremaia while Ralene was on the court.) I do think she's got potential as a point guard, but I don't see her being able to play with Lauren Holden for long stretches, which could be a problem next year, unless Coach commits to Ralene as the backup point guard and Lauren and Bre as the starting backcourt. Zara Jillings continues to make heady plays on the floor, with the occasional unnecessary foul. She had a fantastic hot pass to G'mrice underneath, right near the end of the shot clock when we thought for sure she'd have to be the one to take the shot. I would still like to see her be a little more assertive offensively, but her passing has been fantastic, so there's only so much I can say about that. I'm not sure how I feel about Kendell Heremaia taking nothing but threes. She's strong enough that she might be able to get easy points on the inside, but I'd have to watch her drive to know for certain.

Mary Goulding makes so many plays happen by being in the right place at the right time. She looks incredibly awkward doing it, but somehow she always seemd to be able to come up with the loose ball or the steal. I don't know if I'd call the steal and lay-up a fast break, per se, but it was definitely a break. Johanna Klug picked up a couple of early fouls and never really seemed to be in the flow of the game- she stayed in with the deep bench at the end of the game, which was when she got most of her shots off. She'll be fine next year, IMO; sometimes the freshman wall just hits you that way. G'mrice Davis was on fire. Rhode Island was keying on her inside, very physically, and she still got buckets. She ripped down rebounds with her usual "this ball is mine, like it or not" ferocity and laid a block down on Lassiter that was resounding. Rhode Island knew she was the player to beat, proceeded to try to beat her up, and still couldn't stop her, because that's how G rolls.

Lauren Holden was launching from three, and while sometimes I questioned her shot selection (yes, it's possible to shoot too quickly in the Fordham offense) I can't deny that her three-pointers really broke Rhode Island's collective back. She's so quick, and she does a lot of smart things on the floor. Bre Cavanaugh is cold-blooded. She took over in the second quarter to really push the lead. This wasn't one of her superstar days, but it didn't need to be. She needed to be a threat, and she was, but this was G's night.

There were times when we were out of control on the speed, and I'll credit Rhode Island's defense for that. But there were more times when the interior passes worked, or when we were able to find the open player faster than they were able to react. I think we were on a mission after the loss to St. Joseph's- and now we get the rematch in Richmond. No, that's not going to have a tinge of revenge to it, not at all.

There was a stretch when I was convinced that Jeffrey Smith had the spread at under 30. That would, of course, be unethical, and I would never truly believe a game official would be betting on games. But there were some putrid game management calls in the fourth quarter that kept Rhode Island closer than they had any right to be. If the people in the stands can hear the slap of a hand against an arm, you should probably call the foul.

It's worth mentioning that this game was technically an A-10 tournament game, despite being hosted at Fordham, so certain tournament rules were in effect- introductions alternated between the teams, there was a generic A-10 video before introductions instead of Fordham's video, and all graphics were tournament-based instead of being Fordham's usual ones. However, Rhode Island brought neither band nor cheer, and I don't know if that was by choice, by lack of the appropriate spirit squads, or by tournament by-laws. It would be interesting to get reports from other sites.

Shoutout to the dude who won the timeout shooting contest, including the halfcourt shot. No shoutouts to the students who came, got their free food, played their contests, and fled as soon as they could. Support your school, man.

I miss the band's old arrangement of "Seven Nation Army" (which, given our international nature, should be our theme song of sorts) where one guitar picked out the lyric line while the rest of the band did the usual refrain. That's not to say that the dude whaling on the electric guitar wasn't good, but it was nice to have something different.

The Fordham cheerleaders actually led a cheer! Miracle of miracles! Seriously, I would be louder at Fordham games if I knew their specific cheers.

I think Fordham's on a mission, and I hope they do steal that A-10 title. It would be awesome.