A Primer For Saturday's MIAC Championship Game: GAC vs UST

It's a rematch of last year's MIAC Championship Game as GAC heads back into the Twin Cities to take on six-time defending MIAC Playoff Champ UST over at Schoenecker Arena at 3:00 P.M. on Saturday.  Obviously, NCAA Tournament implications for this contest are heavy with the winner getting the AQ for the MIAC.  While the Tommies are a virtual "lock" for the NCAA Tournament should they come up on the short end of the stick on Saturday, uncertainties still abound for the Gusties although they definitely strengthened their chances by virtue of their semifinal victory over CSB in the semifinals on Thursday night.  But I don't want to spend too much time here speculating on what may or may not happen come Monday so, for the moment anyway, let's take a quick look at some of the numbers and how the regular season meetings between these two teams went.

UST, coming into this game with a stellar 24-2 overall record, dispatched SMU on Thursday night in the other semifinal game.  The Tommies have simply owned the MIAC as of late and swept through the conference portion of their regular season with an unblemished 18-0 record; which, of course, includes two wins over said GAC team.  The first game took place back on December 13 down in St. Peter where the Tommies prevailed by a 74-66 count.  In that game, UST used their trademark defense in limiting GAC to 24-62 from FG range for 38.7% and 3-14 from behind the arc for 21.4%.  In the return game over at Schoenecker Arena, UST thumped the Gusties by a 61-45 count and in that game, cold shooting doomed GAC again as they went 16-55 for 29.1% from FG range and an even icier 4-17 from behind the arc for 23.5%.  Rebounds were nearly even with GAC holding a slight 35-33 edge but the big thing from that contest that stood out to me was that the Tommies held a sizable 28-18 edge in points in the paint.  And a majority of those points came from junior post Hannah Spaulding who finished that night with 22 points.

So from a UST standpoint, it would appear that the secret sauce would be using their trademark defense and getting the edge in the points in the paint as well.  But now some uncertainly swirls around this game for the Tommies wrt the availability of Spaulding who went down with a concussion this last Saturday against CSB.  UST Head Coach Ruth Sinn opted for starting sophomore reserve post Elsa Anderson on Thursday night against SMU and the former Des Moines (IA) Christian standout came through with flying colors to lead a balanced Tommie attack with a "double-double" of 15 points and 10 rebounds so if anyone thinks that UST is going to fall off precipitously with Spaulding on the bench had better think again.  You can't blame Sinn for taking the safe route when it comes to Spaulding as a concussion is simply something you don't want to mess around with and you've got to go through the necessary protocol before you can get cleared to play so we'll just see how things stand for Saturday.

The one encouraging thing for GAC coming into this game on Saturday is that they've had the decided edge on the boards in their wins over both St. Kate's on Tuesday night and CSB on Thursday night.  Against the Wildcats, the Gusties controlled the glass by a 46-36 count and against the Blazers, GAC held a 35-28 cont on the boards against a longer and taller CSB team so the Gusties know how to control the boards given the stats of the last two games.  I think the bigger challenge for GAC coming into this game on Saturday has to be from a mental perspective.  When you've lost to a team for umpteen times in a row as GAC has to UST, there's just a mental block that gets in your head to comes back to bite you when things start going wrong when you play them.  That in mind, here's what I see as the keys to this game from a GAC perspective:


1.  Keep dominating the boards the way you have.  That's a must and doable; particularly if Spaulding is unavailable for this game for UST.

2.  Execute your plays.  That means setting your screens and driving the (expletive deleted) ball into traffic where necessary.  Contact is a part of the game.  Don't be afraid to get physical with them.

3.  Keep your composure.  The one thing UST counts on is getting you into a hole early on and then watching you disintegrate into a pool of frustration. 

4.  Don't settle for "bad" shots.  If you get an open look, take it by all means but don't be jacking up shots that you know aren't reasonably good percentage shots. 


So that's how I see it.  Again, I don't think it's any secret here that the edge goes to UST in this game given their history and their recent performance.  But, as Chris Berman of ESPN always said, "That's why they play the game."