Ventured over to the St Paul side of town again on this midday Saturday which was sunny but cold and over to Leonard Center on the campus of Macalester College - a venue I haven't been to in a while to take in this midseason contest between visiting St. Scholastica and host Macalester. It's been a so-so year for this young Scots team but they were coming into this contest with some momentum on their side with back-to-back wins - over Hamline Monday night and then St. Olaf on Wednesday night - and they had high hopes of extending this streak to three games. The Saints meanwhile had knocked off St. Olaf on Monday night down in Northfield but lost a heartbreaker on Wednesday night to Augsburg at home in Reif Center on a last-second buzzer-beater. Still, this St. Scholastica team has shown noticeable signs of improvement as of late and I knew that I was going to have to cover this game today - even if it wasn't necessarily one of the so-called "marquee" games in the MIAC on this day.
Scoring would come at something of a premium in the opening minutes of the first period as both teams suffered some ill-timed boo-boos that killed off several promising possessions. After freshman guard Gabby Voigt got the Saints on the board first with her short jumper at the 9:32 mark, Macalester would manage to forge ahead as one free throw by freshman guard Sydnee Smith after she was fouled at the 8:08 mark and a Smith jumper in the lane at the 6:55 mark would give the Scots a 3-2 edge. That finally woke up this St. Scholastica team and they shook of some of the early cobwebs that had been plaguing them. Freshman reserve combo guard/forward Hope Carlson would unleash a "3" from the left corner at the 6:42 mark to push the Saints back out in front 5-3 and a bit later at the 5:58 mark, sophomore point guard Lexi Imdieke slashed into the lane and got a finish that got the visitors a 7-3 advantage. But the Scots would waste little time in getting this contest leveled thanks to junior combo guard/forward Peyton Starks as she would first connect with a lay-up at the 5:20 mark and follow that up with a score in the paint right at the 5:00 mark to make it a 7-7 ballgame. But before Macalester could start to get feeling too good about themselves, the Saints would unleash an 11-2 run and the 2-3 "match-up" zone "D" that Head Coach Jason Schmitz was employing did a good job of choking off an interior penetration that Macalester was hoping to get. This run was an artillery barrage of three-point bombs - one by Imdieke from the right wing area with 4:39 left, one by freshman reserve guard Hannah Compton from the right wing area with 3:37 left and another by senior guard Katie Vaske from the left corner with 3:00 left - that had St. Scholastica up 16-9. It would be capped with a tough score in the paint by Imdieke with 1:31 left that stretched the lead to 18-9 before the Scots were able to patch up some of the bleeding on a Starks lay-up with 1:04 left.
As much as a downer it was for Macalester with how the home stretch of the opening period went for them, things definitely started looking up in the early moments of the second period. And what a moment it was for the home crowd as Starks would knock down a pretty jumper from the right wing area at the 8:58 mark that not only narrowed the gap to five at 18-13 but was also the 1,000th-career point for the junior out of St Louis. Scots Head Coach Katie Kollar would call a full timeout so that Starks could be recognized for this achievement and less than a minute later, senior guard Andrea Palmen would connect with a lay-up off of an inbounds pass that suddenly had Macalester back to within a single possession down just 18-15. But just when it appeared that the Scots had perhaps righted the ship, they promptly went into a funk offensively and that opened up the door for St Scholastica to establish considerable more breathing room with a 14-2 onslaught. Slender sophomore guard Jackie Johnson would start this latest run by drilling a casually cruel three-point bomb from the right top area at the 7:17 mark and two free throws by freshman reserve combo guard/forward Hope Carlson after she was fouled with 4:51 left got the lead to eight at 23-15. Then Vaske would find more magic behind the arc with a "3" from the left top area with 3:56 left and would also add a lay-up with 2:50 left to get the Saint lead to 28-17. Imdieke would add one free throw after getting fouled with 1:33 left and then Voigt would cap this run with a "3" from the right corner with 1:00 left that now had St. Scholastica up 32-17. The Scots would get a bit of a reprieve before the halftime buzzer as junior reserve guard Camille Samuel knocked down a jumper from the right elbow area with :21.4 left but too many struggles on the offensive end thus far had Kollar and her Macalester team on the wrong end of a 32-19 score as both teams headed for the locker room for the halftime break.
The Saints would establish their largest lead of the afternoon when Imdieke buried a "3" from the left top area off of an inbounds pass at the 9:46 mark of the third period but Macalester would respond with two quick scores in an effort to once again narrow the gap. Lanky junior combo guard/forward Katherine Norquist would connect with a short, turnaround jumper in the lane at the 9:22 mark and less than a minute later, Starks would connect on a lay-up that had the deficit slimmed down to twelve at 35-23. A bit later at the 6:13 mark Norquist would strike again for the Scots - this time with a well-timed steal and lay-up the other way that kept Macalester in that twelve-point range down 37-25. St. Scholastica would go right back to work in an effort to widen the gap as Johnson would get one free throw to go down after getting fouled at the 5:01 mark and a daring drive into the lane and tough finish by Voigt with 2:07 left had the lead up to fifteen at 40-25. Still, that didn't deter the Scots from making another bid to narrow this gap. With 1:46 left, Starks would get a three-point play the old-fashioned way - on a drive along the left baseline and finish that drew a foul along with the ensuing "and one" that had the deficit down to twelve at 40-28. Smith would add one freebie after getting fouled with :51.5 left and then Norquist would come through with late heroics before this third period ended. She would get the front end of two free throw attempts to go down after getting fouled with :04.9 left and she was somehow able to snare the long rebound attempt off the back-end miss and got a lay-up out of it with just :02.1 left that now reduced the deficit to ten at 42-32 and gave the Macalester faithful some hope going into the fourth period.
The Saints went right to work once the fourth period got going to widen their lead again. Carlson would connect an a short, turnaround jumper off the glass at the 9:25 mark and would follow that up with two free throws after getting fouled at the 8:47 mark that got the lead back up to fourteen at 46-32. But this pesky Macalester squad would keep showing that they weren't going to be the most generous hosts. A lay-up by Smith at the 8:16 mark and two free throws by Starks after she was fouled at the 6:40 mark got the deficit back to ten at 46-36 and two more free throws by freshman guard Mary Daley after she was fouled at the 5:29 mark kept the Scots in that ten-point range again down 48-38. At the 5:23 mark, Starks would come up big again for Macalester as she would get fouled after a steal and would get two free throws to go down out of it and now the Scots had finally crawled back into single-digit range down 48-40 with a ton of time left. St. Scholastica would answer on a lay-up in transition by Johnson on their ensuing possession at the 5:15 mark to make it 50-40 but Macalester's Starks refused to be silenced and with 3:56 left, she would knock down a jumper in the lane that again had the Scots back within single digits down 50-42. Macalester's Kollar would call a timeout to set up some strategy for the home stretch and with 2:58 left, the Scots drew closer when Norquist got a pair of free throws to go down that now had the deficit down to seven at 51-44. The Saints seemed to seal the deal on their ensuing possession when Compton banged home a "3" from the right corner with 2:30 left but again Macalester refused to break out the white flag down ten at 54-44. Norquist would knock down a pair of free throws after getting fouled with 2:11 left and after applying some pressure defense, the Scots were able to snare a steal and Daley would get a lay-up out of the deal that suddenly had the gap narrowed to six at 54-48. That forced St. Scholastica's Schmitz to take a match to a timeout - not so much out of panic but rather to get his team settled down and how they had to close this one out. Which is exactly what the Saints did as they extinguished this last threat from the home team and put the finishing touches on this one. Imdieke would get one free throw to go down with 1:56 left after she was fouled and Vaske would get a pair of freebies to go down after getting fouled with 1:12 left. Johnson would get one more free throw to go down after getting fouled for insurance purposes and St. Scholastica picked up another big road W with a 58-48 victory.
In wading through what was something of a mass confusion at Leonard Center with a track meet going on in another part of the building, I was eventually able to catch up with St. Scholastica Assistant Coach Gene Schaedel. I asked him what's been behind this seeming resurgence of this Saints team that arguably has been taking their lumps the first couple of seasons in the MIAC. He attributed a lot of it to the senior leadership on this team and how the younger players are working extra hard; getting into the gym and doing the necessary off-court work as well. Here's the thing with the Saints in my mind: This is a very young team for the most part and while I think there's too many teams ahead of them in the standings where they can realistically start thinking in terms of competing for a MIAC Playoff spot, they're slowly but surely getting better and the fact that St. Scholastica is starting to trend upward seems sustainable to me. And let's remember something here, too. With any program getting better in this conference, it's usually been a series of steps taking place and that's what's going to likely have to happen for the Saints. Still, there's a lot to like about this team and the future does indeed appear to be bright.
While I don't think Macalester is at the level that St. Scholastica is right now, they're still competing and playing hard till the final buzzer. You can tell that Kollar has been hitting the recruiting trail hard and we all know how incredibly tough it is to get any kid into a school like Macalester. They have two great pieces in both Starks and Norquist who are both just juniors. I think the big challenge for Kollar is developing some of that depth that she now has as it's obvious that both Starks and Norquist have to bear the brunt of the scoring and that shows on the final box score as Starks finished with 21 points and Norquist with 11 points. And it was tough sledding at times for the Scots on offense as well and because they don't have a lot of size, their margin for error is very small and that proved to be a difference - at least in my mind today anyway. You take a look at the final box score of this one and it leaves you a bit perplexed as you see that the Scots had a sizable advantage in points in the paint at 30-18 and they were pretty solid from the charity stripe too going 14-17 for 82.4%. But, going 17-49 from FG range for 34.7% and going 0-4 from behind the arc didn't help matters for them.
St. Scholastica had a fairly balanced scoring attack on this day with Imdieke's 14 points leading the way while both Vaske and Johnson finished with 10 points a piece.
No comments:
Post a Comment