Gustavus vs St. Kate's 2-4-12

After leaving the carnage left behind by UST's convincing win at Augsburg, I then quickly made the trek over to St. Kate's Butler Center where the Wildcats were playing host to second-place Gustavus.  The Wildcats were winless in the conference and have been beset by injuries and inexperience and there was no doubt as to the outcome in this one.  Gustavus was already up 23-6 by the time I got there and settled in at the 8:42 mark.

Gustavus Head Coach Mickey Haller was already substituting liberally by this point; trying to giver her starters ample rest time.  But by the time and caught their breath and got back in they only added to the romp over the hapless 'Cats.  Sophomore Eli Benz got a steal and lay-up the other way at the 8:01 mark and then connected on a turnaround jumper with 6:36 left.  Senior Molly Geske scored at the 6:11 mark.  A pair of scores by junior Kelsey Florian and one of those patented flat three-point bombs by senior Ava Perry plus a steal and lay-up the other way by senior PG Colleen Ruane enabled the Gusties to take a whopping 40-10 lead into the locker room at the half. 

But one of the things that has baffled me about the Gusties is how they seemingly lose their intensity and lack that killer instinct - even in this case when they were already up 40-10.  Granted, Mickey Haller could have dropped a "C-note" and then some on St. Kate's if she really wanted to but that's not her style.  Still, there's that fine line between between keeping the score respectable and losing your intensity at the same time and the Gusties were treading that fine line in the second half that saw the 'Cats actually outscore the Gusties 39-31 and shot nearly 60% of their shots while the Gusties had cooled off to 36% from the field.  No doubt that Gustavus was going to win this game easily enough and they did by a final count of 71-49.  It's just that the Gusties didn't look as focused as they needed to in the second half and, in fact, looked downright sloppy at times.  Freshman Sarina Baker had a very nice second half for the 'Cats as she was able to do some damage inside coming down the stretch.  Of course, the Gusties were able to let the reserves do most of the work toward the end as victory had been pretty much assured early on in this contest.  But it's fair to say that Gustavus had come out with only their "B-" game after the break.