Just the Facts, Ma'am: In a morning match-up, UMBC came out victorious at Seton Hall, overcoming a fourth-quarter deficit in the final minute to win 57-53 over Kennesaw State. Te'yJah Oliver and Janee'a Summers each had 13 points to lead the Retrievers, with Oliver adding a team-high five rebounds. Alexis Poole had 18 points and 10 rebounds for Kennesaw State in the loss.
For a drama in one act, traveling fans, long roads, hazy recollections, and being so tired, join your intrepid and temporally displaced blogger after the jump.
You can't see my face, because this is the Internet, and this will probably be posted several hours after the aforementioned facial expression. But I'm not happy. I'm not happy because it's 7:30 on Sunday morning and I've already been awake for the last hour, because it takes that long to get to Seton Hall from where I am on a Sunday morning. I already disapprove of Seton Hall scheduling games at 11 in the morning, so you can imagine how I feel about scheduling a double-header. Sleep. Sleep is for the weak.
I have such stupid direction-face that I can tell someone I don't know where they're going and they still come back to ask again. And then she gets annoyed that I'm annoyed. I already told you I don't know what you want! Leave me alone!
I think this is the first time I've had a panhandler ask for directions to the place where they're going to beg for money. I'm too tired for this. I'm too tired for everything. Below follows a sample of why.
Panhandler: *panhandles*
Fellow passenger: "You already been this way, go around the other way."
Panhandler: "Nah, I'm not going that way."
(Exit Panhandler, that way.)
So here we are, ready to see Kennesaw State and UMBC in the first game of the second day of Seton Hall's Tip-Off Classic. Didn't get to see a lot of their shootaround because of schmoozing.
Kennesaw State's gear is very yellow. UMBC's gear is very black. They have sort of a baseball look going with their warm-up shirts. I shouldn't be surprised. They're Under Armour. I also shouldn't be surprised at that.
Hi, Danaejah!
At halftime of a competitive but not fundamentally sound game, UMBC is up 23-20 on Kennesaw State.
Under Armour seems to have a sports bra problem. Dominika Skrocka and Kayla Jackson are both bouncing badly. Skrocka is actually giving me sympathy pains in the chest.
Funny moment of the game: ball goes out of bounds behind the "celebrity row" chairs right on the sideline. It ricochets between the chairs and the first row of bleachers a couple of times. Finally, it comes to rest, and Kamiyah Street attempts to pull it up through the space between the seat and the back of the chair, only to discover that said space is not large enough for a basketball. This is followed by Tyler Moore kicking back a completely different chair as if it had offended her sensibilities. (To be fair, it was impeding her ability to inbound the ball.)
Family here for both teams- Berenato's for Kennesaw, Janee'a Summers's for UMBC.
That turned into a very fun game at the end. Free throws win ballgames, or so I've been told. UMBC left the door open briefly, and Kennesaw walked right into the wall.
Sariah Penese played very briefly in the first half and disappeared for the second. Kristen Teklits came into the game and turned the ball over pretty much on her first touch, so that didn't go well. Kayla Jackson got some second half run, and though the foul was a rough start, she played pretty well. Big, tough guard. (for the record, I didn't even notice Silvia Ferreiros come in, which is a little bit embarrassing, so can't comment on a player whose existence I literally forgot)
Dominika Skrocka kept her team in the game late with three-point shooting. Seriously, though, please get her a better bra. I'm about to go beg the Twitter account. Tyler Moore was named by parents who either didn't watch TV or watched too much of it. There's something I like about her, but I can't put my finger on it. Lucrezia Costa got a lot of minutes in the post, and got rough down there.
Janee'a Summers had family, or friends, or someone, in the house, since there was a whole lot of noise for her. I couldn't see them, since they got there after I sat down, but I could hear them. She made some big plays in the fourth quarter. Eryn Fisher got the start, but I don't think she played any of the crucial minutes.
O'lesheya Braxton showed some great defense in the first quarter, then got in foul trouble and sat most of the first half. Then she started the third quarter like gangbusters, driving the lane hard and scoring in rapid succession. I'm very impressed with her- and she's only a freshman! When she wasn't driving, Te'yJah Oliver was. They powered the Retrievers' offense in the second half. Paula Rubio brought height, but left no other impression.
Breanna Hoover didn't start the game for Kennesaw State, but she started the second half, and managed to foul out in those twenty minutes. Well done there, right? Lexi Mann got a few minutes in the first half and didn't look terrible. I'd honestly have gone with her more than I would have Simina Avram, whose only claim to fame in that game was her size. Avram couldn't hit at the rim, couldn't rebound, and kept having to be shuttled in and out of the game because of her conditioning (or lack thereof).
I may be a little tiny bit in basketball infatuation with Alexis Poole. She reminded me so much of one of my all-time favorites, DeAngelique Waithe. Her ups aren't quite as crazy, and she's not the maniac on inbounds that Angel was at LIU. But her style of play is so much the same, in the paint and on the glass (and yes, this does mean missing bunnies). I'm really excited to see how she develops. Carlotta Gianolla had to pick up more minutes than I think she wanted to. I remember her being in the mix a lot, but not necessarily making the play herself.
Amani Johnson ran the show with a firm hand. She's a tough little guard. I like her, too. Visually, she reminds me of Jen Fay, the Quinnipiac player I did so love to hate. (I say this with the greatest of respect.) Their playing style isn't similar, save for their shared love of going after loose balls. I think they need to get more offense from her. I think they also need to get better shooting from Kamiyah Street. I can see the weapon she can be, but it didn't work out in this game.
This isn't quite a power team like Berenato had at Pitt, although they've got some of that with Poole on the inside. I think she's okay with that.
I have to say, this game got pretty exciting in the fourth, when it was a slog of missed shots for much of the first. Both teams stepped up their game late. UMBC just had a little more firepower.
Tuesday, November 13, 2018
November 11th, 2018: UMBC at Kennesaw State (at Seton Hall)
Thursday, December 22, 2016
December 21st, 2016: UMBC at LIU
Just the Facts, Ma'am: After an offensively challenged first half for both teams, UMBC came out strong in the second half to knock off LIU at the Barclays Center, 57-45. Tyler Moore had 17 of her team-high points in the second half to lead the Retrievers. Shanovia Dove came off the bench to lead LIU with 19 points and 10 rebounds, but no other Blackbird cracked double digits.
For clarinets, accordions, mediocre guitarists, excellent Diet Coke, so much dribbling, bad passes, biting the hand that feeds you, and deep concerns about interpersonal relationships, join your intrepid and pensive blogger after the jump.
On the road again, this time off to the Barclays Center for half of a double-header- we'll be watching the Blackbirds of LIU take on UMBC.
(Why only half the double-header? Because I don't care enough about men's basketball to get home at 11:30 when I have a meeting early the next morning.)
We've had fantastic music on this long R ride from Continental to DeKalb. First there was a clarinet player who did beautiful work on some Christmas tunes, then an accordion player who was really good. I love my city sometimes. Most of the time.
We're at T-minus 24 minutes, and there are maybe twenty to twenty-five people in the stands. And I think about a quarter of them are LIU band members. It's weird having a little bit of distance from the team, but I like having some perspective.
Lost Albany fan is lost. The women are playing UMBC; the men are playing Niagara. So think I can ask him for any tips on Imani Tate?
I don't think I like the Nets making all their banners black and white, even from the times when they were red, white, and blue. It just looks wrong somehow. At least the Isles are still rocking the city colors. (White, blue, and orange are kind of a thing with New York teams- see also the Mets and the Knicks. It's a flag thing.)
Looks like we weren't the only ones who made the trip out to Brooklyn from Queens. Hi, Veronica!
At halftime, it's 15-13 LIU. This... has not been an inspiring half of basketball in the name of Brooklyn hoops and the women's game. Six points and five boards for Aja Boyd for LIU; Taylor McCarley has eight out of 13 for UMBC.
The guy across the aisle from us knows his stuff. He agrees that LIU needs to be way more aggressive on offense. There's way too much passing the ball around, not enough attacking. And then Aja drops the ball.
It's kind of cool to have an entrance/intro video for once. LIU's normal scoreboard doesn't allow for one. The whole team was watching in fascination, including the staff.
So, uh. That was a thing that happened. The easy way out would be to say, "Look, I don't want to revisit this game, you don't want me to revisit this game, and Coach Oliver definitely doesn't want me to revisit this game. Let's just talk about the band and the arena and the overpriced but delicious Diet Coke." But I don't take the easy way out in GNoD, so you're going to get the cold hard truth as I see it from the stands.
UMBC's coach is kinda loud and seems fond of using his timeouts. I know you don't get to take them home with you for the next game, but if you're up eight with 11 seconds to go, it might be okay to leave one on the table.
Carly Harris and Kayla Hinderlee only came in at the very end- I think there were 11 seconds left. Come to think of it, that might have been why he called the timeout, which is kinda sweet, but at the same time, is eleven seconds really a reasonable amount of playing time? Hinderlee was so unprepared that she had to be called back to the bench to get her earrings off. Lucrezia Costa was awkward in the middle, picking up three very quick fouls in the second quarter. UMBC's coach went back to her in the second half, with slightly better results.
I honestly didn't notice Emily Russo in the game until the second half, so I don't really have much to say about her. She was probably scrappy on the ball, though- most of the Retrievers were. Taylor McCarley started off like a house on fire- she was pretty much the sole source of offense for UMBC in the first half. She's long and lanky, and used her length and speed to press ahead on fast breaks, slicing through LIU's defense like a hot knife through butter. She started the second half.
McCarley got that start over the other McRetriever, Allison McGrath. I liked McGrath on defense. I'm wondering if she got hurt; she didn't play at all in the second half, and I didn't think she had done anything worthy of being buried on the bench. I didn't see an injury, though. Amanda Hagaman should really have been much more effective- she had good looks at the basket and blew them. She made life difficult on the inside for LIU, though.
Laura Castaldo took her turn as the star of the UMBC offense in the early part of the third quarter, hitting from range. She was a demon defensively, leaping on the slow and telegraphed passes of LIU. (There were a lot of those, but we'll get to that.) When she cooled off slightly, there was Tyler Moore, hitting corner threes and scoring on the break. Te'yjah Oliver quietly ran the point and took contact. (There was one play where I thought LIU was backing off under the mistaken impression that Coach Oliver was somehow related to the Retriever guard and thus fouling her would be a Very Bad Idea.)
LIU, I can't even with the extra passing and the bad passing and the telegraphed passing. More importantly, I can't even with the endless dribbling, the cold-blooded murder by strangulation of a perfectly innocent shot clock, and the utter lack of urgency.
I don't know what Brianna Farris did to get buried at the end of the bench, only dredged up in the fourth quarter to take corner threes off the heel of the rim and devour fouls when the Blackbirds tried to extend the game. On the other hand, the way she played would not indicate that further minutes were deserved. DeAngelique Waithe remains my favorite, despite her occasional bouts of offensive ineptitude. I still like watching her play defense, especially when she drops monster blocks.
Shanovia Dove was unafraid to shoot, which was a marked contrast to the rest of her teammates. She was hitting from deep, as well as from the lane. She's always been streaky, and this was a good day for her. Coach Oliver rode her hot hand for most of the game. Stylz Sanders was extremely active on defense, especially early on. She deflected a lot of balls. Drew Winter, when she took her shot, had a good shot, but like many Blackbirds, she was tentative with it and took too much time to even work up the nerve to shoot.
I don't know if there are drills that a player can practice to improve their hands- their ability to catch passes and hold rebounds. If there are, someone please send a link to Aja Boyd so she can start doing them. She had good passes and fumbled them; she had rebounds and lost them. And she has to finish better in the lane. I think the latter is easier for a freshman to fix than the former. Gabrielle Caponegro was playing scared, and this isn't just my assessment- the guy across the aisle from us was talking about how she wasn't like this in high school. She was hesitant to shoot and unsure of her place in the scheme. I think she has a lot of potential. I don't know if she has the makeup to tap that potential at LIU.
Dionne Coe is going to drive me crazy if she doesn't either start hitting shots or stop dribbling. So much dribbling. So much wasted time dribbling, dribbling, dribbling. The problem was that either she would dribble herself right into a steal or throw the ball right to UMBC because the pass was telegraphed. She's not the answer at point- obviously not for the future, since she's a grad transfer, but I don't think she's even the answer right now, despite her experience. Victoria Powell was just as timid, but slightly more accurate, and at least you can excuse a freshman for being timid. Seneca Richards was in to shoot threes, and while her shot was pretty, it was all she brought to the floor. I'm not sure that a single-dimensional player is a luxury this team can afford to have in the starting lineup.
So, this team. We're in the NEC here. This isn't the Big East; this isn't even the higher echelons of the MAAC. You're not going to get players with full skill sets. If you do, or if you get a player who's only missing one piece, she's probably going to climb the ladder. Witness Jasmine Nwajei going from Wagner to Syracuse, or Sofia Roma going from Wagner to Duke. For that matter, LIU has a history of feeding the BCS, with Kim Mac Millan going to St. John's and Valerie Nainima going to South Carolina. At this level, there has to be a lot more teaching of the game. I'm not sure that's being done. Now, I'm only seeing things from the stands, so I'm not even getting one side of the story. I don't know if the coach isn't coaching, or if the players aren't listening, or if there's some other gap that's not being bridged. But there's a fundamental disconnect between what's being said and what's being done on the court. There's a stark difference between what the flow of the game might dictate and what's actually happening.
I want to get behind them. I really do. The game day experience at LIU is great- cheer is enthusiastic, the band's interesting, and nobody brings the noise like LIU's spirit squad. But I feel like the joy is being squeezed out of everyone once the ball goes up. It's hard to keep your own spirits up that way.
So, uh, Merry Christmas? Happy Hanukkah? Joyous Festivus?
Sunday, November 28, 2010
November 28th, 2010: Brown at UMBC (Iona Thanksgiving Classic)
Just the Facts, Ma'am: 25 points from Michelle Kurowski propelled UMBC to a 75-55 win over Brown in the consolation game of the Iona Thanksgiving Classic. Meghan Colabella added a double-double of 10 points and 11 rebounds for the Retrievers. Lauren Clarke had 11 to lead the Bears, with Aileen Daniels chipping in 10 points and seven rebounds.
For travelogues, crisp ball movement, and the perils of sitting at midcourt, join your intrepid and belated blogger after the jump.
It's the most wonderful time of the year- not for the holidays and the Christmas lights that people are putting up entirely too early and the ever-increasing pressure to buy presents for people and the biting cold that cuts right through your jacket, but the time when the out of conference season really heats up, and teams take every opportunity to travel to new and exciting places that they might not have been before. I love holiday tournaments, don't you?
To get to Iona, you take Metro-North. (Or you drive. But if you're me, you take Metro-North because you don't have a driver's license and no one in their right mind drives in New York.) You're on the New Haven line, which will eventually take you to exciting places in Connecticut if you forget to get off the train. It's not the prettiest of the Metro-North lines- that's the Hudson line, which Billy Joel sang about and which will take you up to Poughkeepsie and Marist if you're so inclined. But once you get past the warehouses and grim apartment buildings of the Bronx, it's a pretty enough ride. New Rochelle is about an hour on the train, and from the station, it's a curvy little cab ride up to the campus. Possibly, it's walkable, but walking involved freezing off bits of myself that I rather like, so I opted for a cab.
The layout of the arena is a bit odd- the gym isn't properly connected to the rest of the athletics center, so you have to go through the basement if you want to get around anywhere. There are small details to the gym itself that I like- the "IONA" in white on the bleacher seats so that even if there's no one there the school spirit becomes clear, the stat board in the back corner that updates team stats in real time, the detailed graphic board that shows player stats when a player is at the free throw line. Of course, the hardest thing to argue with is the $5 ticket prices, even with $1 for the programs.
Brown did not impress me. Their coach was exceptionally slow with her subs, to the point where we were wondering what in the world she was doing in the Ivy League. Their defense reminded me of the middle-school games that you see at halftime- everyone went after the person with the ball. Against a moderately better team than UMBC, this is not going to work. Against UMBC, it worked for a while. We also weren't sure what in the world the coach was thinking with some of the sub patterns, especially in the second half when the game was out of reach- one minute she'd be bringing in the subs from the very end of the bench, the next she'd be calling them back and coming with the starters, almost like a head coach reading off the card for a two-point conversion- "Sure, it's a forty-point game, so the card says I should go for it." (Different numbers, obviously, because points mean different things in football and basketball, but you get the idea, right?)
Lindsay Steele was the first player off the bench in both halves, a guard who got into the mix a bit. We saw a little bit of everyone. The bench player who sticks out the most in my mind is freshman Jordin Juker, who played defense like she fantasizing about suiting up on the Smurf Turf back in Boise and played offense like she never saw a shot she didn't like. Her aggression and assertiveness will serve her well, but she's not going to have a lot of friends on the other teams in the Ivy. I remember thinking that there was a lot of head-desky moments for Carly Wellington.
Lauren Clarke likes to shoot a little bit. It seemed like every time she had the ball in the frontcourt, she was getting ready to put up another three. To be fair to her, UMBC left her embarrassingly open sometimes- we're talking about having enough time to step into the three, not just release it quickly. Aileen Daniels was a name that stuck in my head from the last time I saw Brown, and she has a nice presence inside, even if she couldn't hit a free throw to save her life. I don't think this was her best game, and I wouldn't be surprised to hear about her having good games in the Ivy League season. Sheila Dixon tried to pull off a lot of fancy moves that neither she nor her team were properly prepared for. Nice vertical, though. If the over-the-shoulder pass had gone to someone that could hit a lay-up, I might have remarked on that as one of the best plays of the day. It was reminiscent of Ticha Penicheiro. Lindsay Nickel sort of disappeared until the second half, though that had a bit to do with foul trouble. Hannah Passafulme came on in the second half, with a nice block and a pretty shot on a feed from Daniels.
UMBC didn't like to go to their subs until late in the half- they went almost the entire first quarter (or reasonable facsimile thereof, as I'm aware college games don't use the quarter system) with their starters. I liked what I saw out of Amirah Tucker in garbage time, and Kristen Coles was a useful guard. Chelsea Barker was good as a reserve point guard, though sometimes she thought too much about her own offense.
Where we were sitting (center court, about six rows up) was very neutral ground, though contested might be closer. Behind us was a family of Brown fans. In front of us was a contingent from Montclair. My wild guess is that they were there for the kid from Upper Montclair, Meghan Colabella. She started off well, but she faded later in the game. Erin Brown came up with the shots when they needed them. Tope Obajolu did a great job of rebounding and coming up with the loose ball, but she couldn't hit the broad side of a barn if you spotted her an extra barn to aim for. Michele Brokans spent a lot of the game in foul trouble, and she did a nice job of staying out of it once she got the fourth foul. The player who impressed me for the Retrievers was Michelle Kurowski. I'm not just talking about the way she shredded Brown's defense. Her court vision was well above par. She kept the ball movement going smoothly.
I was sort of disappointed in the referees. I'm starting to think that points of emphasis are much more of a guide than the NCAA planned for them to be- the officials seemed more worried about calling travels and slight contact than they were about some of the more heavy-duty contact that was going on.
Things that impressed me about UMBC: ball movement. A positive A/TO is a lovely thing to see in a basketball game. In a depleted America East, they might make some noise.