Whitewater: Where we Stand

Duhawks Fans,
Last night found your Loras women back on the road traveling to UW-Whitewater for a battle with the nations #1 ranked team…a team that presented a great challenge and a style of play that will prepare us well for what we will face against a few teams in the conference.

The girls came out of the gates executing very well. At the eight minute mark of the first half, we were up 24-11 and held a double digit lead 12 minutes into play (30-19). A string of turnovers on our end allowed the Warhawks to chip away a bit as the half neared and took a 3 point lead into the locker room (40-37). We played the second half within 3-7 points for the first ten minutes until their combination of strength in the paint and clutch shooting wore on us and we ended up down 86-74 when the final horn sounded. Boxscore

Freshman forward Alex Hudson led us in scoring with 21 points and had a game high 8 rebounds. Lindsay Bava (19 points) continued her excellent play from the 2-guard spot for us and Sarah Pillon (13 points) continued her hot shooting (20-30 the last 3 games).

Some of the good things I saw:
1) We shot the ball well again and put one of the highest point totals on Whitewater in the past two seasons. For the game we finished 56% from the field, 55% from 3, and 92% from the line. In a year where much doubt was probably placed on us filling the void of recent graduate and new assistant Natalie Pucci, I am happy to see our offense has adapted well.
2) We attacked the rim pretty well from the guard positions and finished with 22-24 from the line as well as a slew of good looks inside off of our 4 out series.
3)We fought…and we fought hard. We showed character and competed more than any other time is this season’s short span. As a coach, you want your team to compete like a champion each day, game or practice and I think we did that against Whitewater….now to carry that into practice on Monday. I told the team after the game I was extremely happy with how hard they played and, at times when it would have been easy to pack their bags, how much character they showed to battle back.

Aside from the boxscore and the writeups, there is a little bit of a silver lining. We traveled and played without one of our post players, a center that averaged 10 points and 7 rebounds a game last year. Within her averages, Mindy also would have allowed us the flexibility of throwing another body in the paint to negate the impact that their All-American had/would have had.

Conference season starts on Wednesday at Coe to play a very well coached and traditionally very disciplined conference contender! As usual, all links to broadcasts can be found on the top right hand side of the blog!
Another update to follow soon! GO DUHAWKS!
-Coach J

Beloit Recap: A Tale of Two Halfs

Hello again!
With the holiday season upon us, I hope your Thanksgiving went well!
Tuesday’s game against Beloit, our second consecutive at home, was one of mixed emotions. There were times we all wished halftime would come sooner…understandable with a stat line that read 8-29 from the field and with 12 turnovers; a quick glance at the scoreboard had us down 25-19. Our offense was stagnant in the first half…we failed to find any rhythm and when we did attack the rim, it wasn’t within the scope of what we typically do. On to halftime!

The second half from an offensive standpoint was run to near perfection. The girls put forth a 54 point twenty minute effort that saw only 5 shot attempts missed, 4 layups and an open three. We finished 18-23 from the floor (78%), 6-7 from 3 (86%), and 12-15 from the line (80%). More importantly, we finished up when the final horn sounded 73-66. A great second half effort, one of the best in Loras history. Sophomore guard led the way for us on 7-10 shooting totaling 20 points. Three other Duhawks added a double digit scoring night (Lisa Morrissey-15 points, 6 assists/Lindsay Bava -12 points, 3 assists/Alex Hudson-12 points, 6 rebounds). Boxscore

The girls performance for that twenty minutes was not only fun to watch, but really had me wanting more. I am intrigued if the Mike D’Antoni (current coach of the New York Knicks and former coach of the Phoenix Suns) goal of not missing a shot the entire game is really possible. After watching film again and picking apart those five shots, I loved every one of them and I really believe, if we had to shoot them again, we would convert.

Anyway…that nights game didn’t occupy our attention for much longer than after the buzzer sounded. We travel to UW-Whitewater Saturday in a tussle that pairs us with the nations #1 ranked team. We are anxious for the test that awaits us there and welcome the chance to gauge our progress thus far.

Broadcasts for the game, as always, can be found on the upper right hand side of this blog.
Looking forward to our next post and what awaits us on Saturday!!!

GO DUHAWKS!
-Coach J

A two win week

Last Friday’s 86-62 home win over crosstown rival Clarke College capped off our first full week of games, one of which saw your Duhawks finish 2-1 overall. Box Score

A closer game than I would have liked for the first 10 minutes, the Crusaders found themselves down just 3. Our defense provided our offense plenty of scoring opportunities as we closed the last 10 minutes of the first half on a 29-9 scoring run to head into the locker room up 49-25. I thought we ran well in the first half and we talked better than we had before….we did provide Clarke with half of their scoring output because of turnovers or offensive rebounds. The second half was much of the same. We had the opportunity to go to our bench early and often with everyone playing a minimum of 8 minutes and no one playing more than 24.
Junior Lindsay Bava led us again finishing the night with 20 points in just 20 minutes played. Classmate Lisa Morrissey shot it well and tallied 11 while sophomore Sarah Pillon finished 70% from the field to add 16. Off our bench, I thought two newcomers, Erika Derks and Kelsey Yerkes asserted themselves more offensively and had productive nights. Writeup
A few numbers to crunch….As a team we shot 47.8% from the floor and 36% from 3. Although we are not shooting at our percentage goals from three (40%), it is good to see that percentage gradually increase with each game we play. I was happy with our 26 points off 17 Clarke turnovers, something I really think we have a chance to do every time out with the strength of our transition game. We scored 1.07 points per possession in the first half (the best we’ve done in a half though this young season) and finished the game averaging .92 points per possession.
BELOIT tomorrow…5:30 tipoff at the AWC. They start 5 guards and really really attack the rim! I think there will be matchup problems on both ends with us trying to match their quickness but they will have to gameplan for our bigs. The Bucaneers enter with a 1-1 record and run a memphis style offense, will press the entire game and I would expect some zone as well. It’ll be great to get them at home! Our girls will be taking off for Thanksgiving after the game tomorrow night as the schedule puts a few wrinkles in family plans I am sure. We play Whitewater on Saturday…and need 2 days to prep for them…thus will be bringing the team back late on Thursday night, giving them Wednesday and some of Thursday to be with family.

Thats all from this end for now….Have a great Thanksgiving Weekend!
-Coach J

Overtime!!!

We are 24 hours removed from our first win..a battle against Augustana that really tested the character of our young team. We knew coming in that Augie presented an interesting matchup for us. They were long, athletic, and physical, what I thought would be a good transition from Winona State. The game started in see-saw fashion, we held the lead most of the first half and closed the frame up 4 (30-26). Not a ideal half for us. We missed 12 layups that really could have opened this one up. Our 3’s weren’t falling as we were only 2-13 from deep. Defensively, we held them to 29% shooting but between our missed chances and failure to capitalize on thier mistakes, kept the game close. Augie countered our early 2nd half run with one of their own and capitalized by really out working us for a 4 minute spurt. We were down 11 with 12 minutes to play.

A switch went off and over the course of the next 15 minutes, we played really really well…just as we are capable of playing. We scored 36 points in 24 possessions, committing only one turnover, and started hitting those open jumpers we were getting all night. Defensively, we picked up the intensity and played with the urgency we need to every possession. I was happy with how we rebounded in that spurt offensively and defensively. The 5 minute overtime period found us putting 18 on the board. Decision-making and confidence continued to climb throughout and clutch stops and clutch shots gave us our first win of the year (81-71).

Lindsay Bava headlined the scoring with a game high 25 points. The junior made clear she was the best player on the floor hitting two of the biggest 3’s I have seen…much a credit to the defense she shot over on consecutive possessions in overtime. Fellow classmate Mindy Meyer anchored the post like she so often does and is starting to get her legs under her a bit after limited work this preseason. Mindy finished 8-10 from the field and I think establishing her and Makeda Queen underneath really opened things up a bit for our jumpshooters. Lisa Morrissey did her usual at the point for us…dropping 8 assists to her two turnovers. She really sets the tone for our fast break and made good choices in the half court as well. Backup PG Dani Pillon gave us some quality minutes off the bench by really taking care of the ball while doing lots of little things well.

Freshman Alex Hudson’s stat line (16 points 11 rebounds) from our 4 spot is enough to warrant some praise but her performance goes beyond the numbers. Alex had a chance to break a 63-63 tie with 2 seconds left in regulation and ended up missing two free throws. I could talk about pressure and being a freshman but the pressure is hard to write about and she isn’t a freshman anymore. Alex demanded the ball in overtime and hit a huge shot for us early…the competitor in her really stood out. You really cant put into words how happy I was to see her come back the way she did, when everything inside her may have been telling her otherwise.

We will continue to prep for our Clarke game on Friday…tipoff set for 7:00. It will be great to get a home game in!

Go Duhawks!

-Coach J

Regular Season Tips Off!

We have officially began our trek for a conference championship as last nights journey to Winona, MN to play Winona State University tipped off the non-conference portion of our schedule.

I am happy with how we played against a strong NCAA D2 school. The final score (83-63) really does not do our team justice. We played with them through a see-saw first half (33-28 at half) and found ourselves down 8 with about 12 minutes to go in the game. A string of 3 consecutive turnovers, of which Winona State converted into 8 points really hurt our chances of any upset. The rest of the game, any energy we spent to make a comeback was quickly countered by a longer and stronger team. We have to find a way to limit the bleeding when it does happen. 3 times in the game, we turned the ball over on three consecutive possessions.

A few other notes: I thought we rebounded very well…one of the keys to our performance and something we stressed all week in preparation. We ended up outrebounding them 41-27. Their length made it hard on our shooters and I would be shocked if we shoot 17% from 3 again anytime this year. We finished the game 3-17 from beyond the arc. I was happy with our shot selection there though as almost every one of the 17 attempts are ones we want in practice on a daily basis. I was pleased with our dribble penetration. I think if we limit our string of turnovers in a few stretches and knock down the jumpers we consistently make in practice, we would have been in a good spot. We will also emphasize a bit more inside this week and try to get some attempts from our posts. After watching things again, we played pretty hard for about 34 minutes so, effort, although not as consistent as we need, is there…working to turn that into positive things as we switch worlds into D3 this week should pay off well.

Augustana is a competitive team, young but scrappy and they have a few really great scorers. They are very similar to us in terms of what they run. Taking care of the ball will be a necessity for us. Winona will likely be the best lineup match up against this year, and while committing 22 turnovers in that game, we must be sure to keep sharp mentally and value every possession we have.

Here is a link to the Augustana live stat page: http://www.augustana.edu/athletics/wbasketball/xlive.htm

Our men’s soccer team is hosting the NCAA Sweet 16 so we will be without audio broadcast for the Augustana Game. Friday’s game will be both video and audio fed through our website.

Looking forward to building on this past weekend and moving in a positive direction tomorrow night!

-Coach J

Game Day Tomorrow…

Well the day we have been waiting for is almost here. With our first game tomorrow night against Winona State, it will be a great test to see how far we have come as a team since the first day of preseason. We are all excited to get up and down the court against a good basketball team. It will be a tough game, but we have the personnel to compete with anyone we come up against. We are ready to face our tough non-conference schedule in preparation for conference play.

This fall volleyball, women’s soccer, and men’s soccer made it to the NCAA tournament, we are ready to follow along in the success of Loras College, and make our mark at the NCAA tournament. Our road begins tomorrow, and I couldn’t be more excited with the potential this team has. As long as we stick together as team, are determined, and believe we can be successful, we are going to have a great year.

“It’s never an upset if the so-called underdog has all along considered itself the better team”

Go Duhawks!!!

Lisa Morrissey #32

only 8 more days…

Well here we are almost a month into practice, counting down the days until our first game. We had our first scrimmage last weekend vs. UW-Platteville with our second coming up tomorrow vs. Benedictine University. Our first scrimmage was a great chance for us to see how far we have come since the first day of practice. While we still have some things to work on, it was great to get up and down the court and start playing. With our first-scrimmage-nerves gone, we are looking forward to building on the good things we did in our first scrimmage and taking those into our second scrimmage at Benedictine.

What we are really preparing for is our first game vs. Winona State on November 15. It will be a huge test for us and a great chance to see where we are at and how far we have come. While we have an extremely tough non-conference schedule, we know that it will be great preparation for the heart of our season and our conference play. Conference is up for grabs this year and we aren’t taking a back seat to anyone. Our team has so much potential and once we start playing we will be able to see what we can accomplish and how truly successful we can be.

“Nothing truly worthwhile is ever easy”

Until next time, GO DUHAWKS!

Lindsay Bava # 14