Finally, for the first time since March of 2020 I got to cover a game in person and I can't even begin to tell you how good this felt. On this Wednesday night of Beat SC Week I traveled over to Roseville and Ericksen Center on the campus of the University of Northwestern for this early season MIAC - UMAC clash as the host Eagles prepared to take on St. Kate's. I got there in plenty of time to get myself settled in to enjoy an impromptu supper of McDonald's (I don't do that very often) washed down with God's Nectar (aka Pepsi) and watch both teams warmed up. I knew coming in that this Northwestern team had a lot of potential but it also has a lot of new, young faces. Ditto for the Wildcats as I knew Head Coach Don Mulhern would get many of his underclassmen some valuable playing minutes.
After senior forward Megan Roberts got her Eagles team on the board first at the 9:16 mark of the opening period after she got fouled behind the arc and got two of three free throw attempts to go down, St. Kate's was able to get the contest knotted at two a piece on a tough lay-up by grad senior Brooke Torvik at the 8:54 mark. It was at this point, however, where things quickly went south for the Wildcats as this stunningly deep and explosive Northwestern team unleashed a game-changing 16-0 run. Two scores in the paint by senior post Hailey Paup - one at the 8:17 mark and another at the 7:15 mark on back-door plays - got the Eagles a 6-2 advantage and then Roberts would uncork a three-point bomb from the right wing area at the 6:37 mark to push the lead to 9-2. Fellow senior guard Allison Eide would connect with a lay-up at the 6:18 mark to stretch the lead to 11-2 and the 'Cats Mulhern; not at all liking what was unfolding before his eyes, called a timeout to get his troops reassembled. But this stoppage in play didn't have the desired effect of cooling down this Northwestern one bit. Eagles Head Coach Aaron Kahl inserted willowy freshman reserve guard Lexi Hagen and she made the most of the early opportunity. The former Jordan standout would first make a hard drive to the rim for a finish off the glass at the 5:35 mark and a little more than a minute later with 4:31 left, Hagen would knock down a short jumper in the lane to make it 15-2. With 2:41 left, St. Kate's made the mistake of leaving Hagen all alone in the left corner and she would make the Wildcats pay as she unleashed a killer "3" that now made it 18-2 and now St. Kate's Mulhern had no choice but to take a match to another timeout as he had to find some answers for his team - quickly. Wildcat junior reserve forward Sarah Lavell finally broke the drought for her team when she snared an offensive rebound for a putback with 2:26 left but Northwestern was far from finished with their offensive onslaught. Eide would drain back-to-back three-point bombs - one from the left wing area with 1:54 left and then again from the left top area with 1:22 left to make it 24-4. St. Kate's finally had a couple of answers in the waning moments of this first period thanks to freshman reserve forward Sydney Elliott as she would uncork back-to-back three-point bombs of her own - one from the right top area with 1:01 left and another one with :27 left from the left wing area - that reduced the deficit down to fourteen at 24-10 by the time the first period buzzer sounded. Still, Northwestern seemingly had all the answers thus far and the Wildcats had a lot of work in front of them.
And the Eagles certainly showed no signs of slowing down anytime soon either. Freshman guard Taylor Schuck would start things out in the second period by burying a "3" from the left corner at the 9:40 mark and another Paup score in the paint on another pretty back-door play at the 7:37 mark boosted Northwestern's lead to 29-10. The 'Cats would try and make up some lost ground as one free throw by freshman reserve post Nicole Dalman at the 7:20 mark and a lay-up in transition by junior forward Bree Glynn at the 7:05 mark along with a three-point bomb by freshman reserve forward Greta Schimnowski at the 6:05 mark had the deficit reduced to sixteen at 32-16 but cutting into the deficit even further was proving to be a bridge too far - at least at this juncture anyway. The Eagles would get another boost on yet another "3" by Hagen - this one from the right wing area with 4:14 left along with a score in the paint by reserve grad senior Ashlyn Jones with 2:17 left that made it 37-18. The exclamation point by Northwestern came with just :41 left in the second period when freshman reserve forward Jasmine Sondrol made a hard drive along the left baseline and got a pretty one-handed finish off the glass to make it 39-19. Glynn would get one more score for the Wildcats with just one tick left before the halftime break with her lay-up but Mulhern and his St. Kate's team were still staring at an eighteen point deficit going into the locker room at the intermission.
The big question going into the third period then would be how would St. Kate's respond after getting bruised, bullied, outhustled and outscored in that first half. It didn't take long to see that whatever Mulhern said in that locker room during the halftime break definitely had the desired effect. After the Eagles pushed their lead to twenty at 41-21 on a routine score in the paint by Paup at the 9:42 mark, the 'Cats showed a renewed energy, fight and desire and unleashed a surprise 10-0 run to crawl right back into the thick of things. Senior forward Sam Orth started things out with an offensive rebound and putback at the 9:22 mark and fellow senior post Katie Benjamin knocked down a short jumper from the right side at the 8:55 mark to get the deficit down to sixteen at 41-25. Orth would then knock down a pair of free throws after getting fouled at the 7:54 mark and then freshman reserve guard Marissa Fronk would snare an offensive rebound for a putback at the 7:12 mark that now had the deficit down to twelve at 41-29 and Northwestern's Kahl; a bit apprehensive at this point, called a timeout as the full- and half-court pressure that the Wildcats were using was having a detrimental effect on his team. Still, St. Kate's prospects looked much brighter when Schimnowski snared an offensive rebound for a putback at the 5:49 mark that now had the deficit down to ten at 41-31. That got the attention of the Eagles and they went right back to work to try and establish some more breathing room. Paup would get into the paint for one score at the 5:37 mark and senior point guard Kelsea Lund would bang home a "3" from the left top area at the 5:19 mark to make it a 46-31 ballgame but the Wildcats still had another push in them. Sophomore reserve guard Karis Zezza muscled into the paint for a score with 4:14 left and then Schimnowski would strike from behind the arc at the right top area that again had St. Kate's in that ten-point range down 46-36 with a ton of time left. But the energy expended making this series of runs finally took its toll on the 'Cats as Northwestern would again start pulling away - this time for good. Lund would uncork a trey from the right wing area with 3:00 left and also drop two freebies after getting fouled with 2:31 left to get the lead back to fifteen at 51-36. Hagen would knock down a short jumper from the left side off of an inbounds pass with 1:42 left and then Jones would get a three-point play the old fashioned way with a lay-up that drew a foul along with the obligatory free throw that now had the Eagles in a much better position up 56-39 going into the fourth period.
Paup's two free throws after the Cedar Falls, IA native got fouled at the 9:01 mark of the fourth period got the lead to ninetten at 58-39 and the dwindling fortunes of St. Kate's in this contest were probably best exemplified at the 8:35 mark when senior guard Mackenzie Kurczek had her Zion Williamson moment as her shoe inexplicably broke on her and she had to come out of the game. Roberts two free throws at the 7:15 mark pushed the Eagles lead to 60-39 and this gave Northwestern's Kahl a chance to insert some of his younger players so they could get some valuable minutes. Freshman reserve guard Rylie Hirschey certainly didn't disappoint as she drained a cold-blooded "3" from the left wing area with 4:42 left. The Wildcats certainly weren't throwing in the towel as one score in the paint by Benjamin with 2:52 left and an offensive rebound and putback by Orth with 2:16 left and an Orth drive and finish with 1:43 left kept things respectable. Orth would also connect with a short jumper in the lane with 1:07 left but Northwestern's Hirschey would steal the spotlight in the waning moments. The former Pine River Backus standout would connect with a lay-up with :52.9 left and would also drain her second trey of the evening from the left top area with :16.8 left as the Eagles claimed a convincing 70-53 victory.
St. Kate's Mulhern could only lament afterward at some of the miscues his team committed early on in the contest that really opened the door for Northwestern to grab a sizable lead early on. His team deserves a lot of credit for staging a strong comeback in that third period when twice they got the lead reduced to ten points and if they could have found a way to whittle it down further into single digits, it may have been a completely different ballgame. But the thing that really stood out to me on this night was this Northwestern team and how deep they are. To be sure, the Eagles suffered a blow early on this season when senior guard Brooklyn DeKam went down with an ACL injury that takes her out of action for this season. But the encouraging thing to me is that Kahl has so many others that he can rely on whether it's his starting chain-gang or reserves coming off the bench. Roberts and Paup are a formidable 1-2 punch down low and having Jones and Sondrol come off the bench are huge assets. Hagen certainly had her moments coming off the bench on this night and Kahl admitted that he had to get Hirschey some playing time this night after she scored 25 points in a recent JV game. In his 12th season at the helm of the Northwestern program, Kahl has never had this kind of depth before and he admitted as much to me when I prodded him on the subject. It's easy to see that Northwestern can definitely be a factor in the UMAC title chase. Both Paup and Hagen led the way for the Eagles on this night with their 12 points and Roberts wasn't far behind with her 10 points. Orth meanwhile was the only Wildcat in double figures scoring-wise with her 11 points. A closer look at the box score will show that St. Kate's definitely had the advantage on the boards at 36-26 which seems kind of odd at first glance. True, they did turn the ball over 24 times in this game but Northwestern had 21 turnovers so those two stats kind of cancel each other out. Even more striking is that St. Kate's held a 22-9 advantage in those all-important "second chance" points. To me, the difference was that St. Kate's shot an icy 22-56 from FG range for 39.3% and an equally frigid 4-14 from behind the arc. Mulhern will be the first to tell you that that won't get the job done. If there was one red flag on the Northwestern side, I'd say that would come from the charity stripe where they were only 9-18 on this night for for a straight 50%. They got away with that on this night but there'll be other games where that could come back to bite them.
No comments:
Post a Comment