B1G Game 15: Gophers Host Penn State (2-17-19)

Sweet Bello to Perez play.

I feel like there is a lot more opportunity for Perez to cut to the basket more often. She has a really good shot which teams should respect. She seems to play in the corners behind the arc. Lots of opportunities for easy layups with cuts to the basket.
 



Great win. Really nice to get some rest for starters and minutes for the bench. We need this kind of offensive game on Thursday. 6 straight!
 

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This is not including today's game.
 



My play of the day.

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Where did all that offense come from? PSU isn't a defensive juggernaut, but the Gophers offense was very impressive today. All of the starters had great games for the Gophers. For a team that couldn't figure out a zone defense earlier in the year, the Gophers shredded the PSU zone today. Brunson with some great drives to the hoop, Bello with a double-double, Bell with one of her better games this year with good decisions, lots of assists, and good shooting. And lots of smiles from Bell today. Pitts with her fourth straight 20-point game and Perez with her career high. It was great to see the bench players get a chance for some minutes and great to see the starters cheering them on. Too bad we have three bench players hurt. (K. Bello, Staples, Tomancova.) My heart stopped when Bell went down with the ankle injury. Glad to see her back so quickly. Maryland next for the Gophers. They're beatable, even at home, but it's going to be a tall order for the Gophers to beat them. The Gophers play 3 ranked teams to end the season. Normally, I would cringe at the thought of that, but I'm going to look at it as an opportunity instead. If the Gophers can win those games, they have a shot at an NCAA tourney berth. And the Gophers are playing well...beating 6 teams that were above them in the conference standings.
 

The Lady Gophers are playing confident and having fun.
 



Gophers were shooting 60% from 3 midway through the 3rd quarter. Penn State's defense was beyond bad, but the Gophers played a fantastic game. It was great to be there for the cancer awareness game. What a wonderful crowd and great tribute to cancer survivors and fighters.
 

I feel like there is a lot more opportunity for Perez to cut to the basket more often. She has a really good shot which teams should respect. She seems to play in the corners behind the arc. Lots of opportunities for easy layups with cuts to the basket.

{Plus Shades play-of-the-day video.}

Yes, very nice. Good court vision by Taiye. Good execution by Irene.

We could probably get away with a play like that a couple times per game. Defenses get lulled into thinking Irene only shoots from 3. Taiye gets ball in high post, attracting double or triple team. Somebody must be open, in this case Perez wide open.
 

Disaster seemingly struck at the start with both team's drivers, Bell and Page, being helped of the court and down to the locker room. Whew. Relief when they both returned. Then it became full dress practice time with a crowd for the Gophers (the second half especially).

We even scored on a couple of inbound plays. One may not have been a play-Bello was unguarded and just dropped down from the foul line to the low block for a pass and a layup. The other was Pitts' short corner jumper which we've seen before.

Staples still has a brace on her ankle; the other three DNPs have no noticeable issue.

ABOVE .500!

YOU get double figures and YOU get double figures and YOU get a double double and You get....Everyone gets double figures! Well almost.
 
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Unfortunately, rutgets and msu won't be ranked tmrw. But at least their rpi will still be high
 



[video]https://www.btn2go.com/video/top-plays-penn-state-at-minnesota--big-ten-womens-basketball[/video]

BTN: Kenisha Bell's top three plays of the day.
 

With 4 out of 12 players benched due to injury, that could be kind-of scary. Thankfully the Penn-State defense was a little lightweight. But it still could be scary rolling into three very tough games. So this is a good practice game to get our shooters a chance to loosen up.

You know Whalen is short on bench players when, to finish up the game and give some key starters a rest, she is forced to play a 3-post/2-guard offense. Well, good to practice that, actually, you never know when our guards might start fouling out or get injured. I'll say one thing about the 3-post lineup - we sure get a lot of rebounds! 48 for the game, to Penn State's 27, a ratio of 1.815:1. That's 25 second-chance points for the Gophers to Penn State's 10. The second-chance points by themselves account for half of the 30-point margin of victory.

Also, we had 22 fast-break points to their 8, a fast-break-point margin of +14. So summing fast-break-points margin plus second-chance-points margin = 29 out of the 30-point margin of victory. That isn't the whole story, though, since our good three-point shooting also certainly played a positive role in the win.

Perez with a career-record 16 points, including 4-6 from deep. Over the last four games (Indiana/Northwestern/Purdue/Penn State) Perez has shot 10-13 = .769 from deep. On her last trey of the day, I loved the way Pitts cheered, jumping up and down (Lamke-like) on the sidelines. Pitts also scores 4 three-pointers. Byrne scores a trey.

Pitts with another 20+ points, namely 22. She had 13 in the first quarter, I believe.

Bell plays very efficiently, shooting 7-12 (.583) and with ONLY ONE TURNOVER to her 7 assists.

Bello shoots another perfect game, 7-7 for 14 points, plus her 13 rebounds gives her yet another double-double. And all 7 of those made shots were contested shots against a defense that gave her attention. And 3 steals.

Brunson plays a great game. And she has a Bell-like stat line. The only words I can think of are that she put on an awesome demonstration of NYC street ball. Hopefully she would take that as a compliment.

What a nice even distribution of points:
Pitts 22
Bell 17
Brunson 17
Perez 16
Bello 14
Lamke 6
Byrne 3
Kaposi 2

That's five starters with 14 or more points. For what it's worth, I think we play better as a team when we get this kind of broad distribution of point contribution - especially in conjunction with a high Bell assist:turnover ratio of 7 (as opposed to some games that we'd just-as-soon forget in which Bell had a turnover:assist ratio of 2 or 3.

Great game and good prep for the gauntlet games we must run next.
 
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https://gophersports.com/news/2019/...penn-state-to-push-b1g-win-streak-to-six.aspx

The Gophers' six straight conference wins tie for the second longest in program history. The only longer streak came when they won 11 in a row from Feb. of 2003 to Jan. of 2004, the junior and senior seasons of head coach Lindsay Whalen.

...

Junior Taiye Bello recorded her 10th double-double of the season with 14 points and 13 rebounds. She was a perfect 7-of-7 from the floor, marking just the eighth performance in team history, and her second this year, with that many attempts without a miss. Earlier this year, she was 9-of-9 at Michigan on Dec. 31. Janel McCarville and Amanda Zahui B. are the only other players in team history to have multiple games where they've attempted at least seven shots and not missed.
 

http://www.startribune.com/gophers-women-s-basketball-team-wins-sixth-game-in-a-row/505967352/


What ended as a feel-good rout began with a felt-bad ankle twist.

“It was nerve-racking, for sure,” Gophers coach Lindsay Whalen said of watching her star guard go down. “But I knew Key is tough.”

Said Bell: “I went downstairs and tightened up my ankle braces and my shoes, ran a little back and forth downstairs, then came back up. I just got to fight through the pain. I knew my team would appreciate me being tough, coming out and helping out as much as I can. I know it’s best not to show it on your face when you’re in pain. One of the greatest of all time, Michael Jordan, played with the flu and didn’t show it. You’ve just got to fight through the pain.”
 




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