STrib: Minnesota Rebounds from Low Point

[Ignatius L Hoops]

Gophers women enter game vs. Michigan still on rebound from low point

The team has distanced itself from Destiny Pitts' exit, ugly loss.

www.startribune.com

The most important items in the article:

“We try not to think too far ahead,” freshman point guard Jasmine Powell said. “But we’re doing everything for a reason. We’re winning games. We’re thinking about the future, but we’re staying in the present.”

It won’t be easy. Brunson — who took an elbow to the head in the Rutgers game — is doubtful for Monday’s game. Freshman guard Sara Scalia hurt her right ankle/foot late in the Wisconsin game and is day-to-day but also could miss the game.

 

[#2Gopher]

Without knowing the full status of Scalia and Brunson. I'd keep them out for the long haul. Would be brutal without them.

 

[thatjanelpick]

Call me an optimist, but I'm going to read "could miss the game" as "She's playing but we don't want Michigan to know that."

 

[CutDownTheNet]

Gophers women enter game vs. Michigan still on rebound from low point

The team has distanced itself from Destiny Pitts' exit, ugly loss.

www.startribune.com

The most important items in the article:

Youngblood makes some interesting comments in his Sunday piece. His update on health of Brunson and Scalia doesn’t sound all that promising, at least for Monday anyway.

He points out that we’re not out of the hunt for an NCAAs invite just yet (and notes that our better SoS thanks to stronger non-conf schedule is a big part of that). This is correct - we’re not mathematically out of it yet. Beating Michigan is important to keep it that way.

He quotes some stats, noting that within the B1G we’re 4-0 and in all games 10-0 when we limit our opponents to under 40% field-goal shooting. And notes that we held Rutgers to 35.2% and @Wisconsin to 36.2%. Of course the importance of defense probably can’t be stressed enough.

However, the goal of keeping the opponent shooting under 40% is quite an oversimplification of the matter. Take the @Wisconsin game for example. Sure, we held Wisconsin to 36.21% field-goal shooting. But they held us to 36.51% shooting. That’s only 3/10 of a percent advantage for us - or virtually a tie in that department. It turns out that, from the “whole game” perspective, what was more important for that win was our better (and larger quantity of) three-point shooting, and better rebounding.

Making things even more complicated yet, was the fact that it was one of those “tale of two halves” games (or perhaps partly, per some accounts, a tale of two halves with two separate officiating standards).

Per the by-half shooting-percentage stats below, we actually held Wisconsin to 25.93% shooting in the first half (which is certainly way below 40%); but in the second half we “let them” shoot 45.16%. Meanwhile, we shot 38.46% in the first half (also below 40%, but a heck of a lot higher than 25.93%); while in the second half we shot 33.33%.

We won the first half, and we lost the second half, but we won the first half by sufficiently extra points such that as we blew through our lead, we had enough lead to last us until Big Maaash hit that dagger triple and Tsipis got himself a T.

@Wisconsin Game %

Minn

FG 23-63 36.51%
3FG 10-26 38.46%
2FG 13-37 35.14%

Wisc

FG 21-58 36.21%
3FG 4-13 30.77%
2FG 17-45 37.78%

@Wisconsin 1st Half %

Minn

FG 15-39 38.46%
3FG 6-17 35.28%
2FG 9-22 40.91%

Wisc

FG 7-27 25.93%
3FG 2-6 33.33%
2FG 5-21 23.81%

@Wisconsin 2nd Half %

Minn

FG 8-24 33.33%
3FG 4-9 44.44%
2FG 4-15 26.67%

Wisc

FG 14-31 45.16%
3FG 2-7 28.57%
2FG 12-24 50.00%

 

[Shades]

Without knowing the full status of Scalia and Brunson. I'd keep them out for the long haul. Would be brutal without them.

It hurts depth having them out (as if Whalen would use any of her depth anyway), but having these two out might force Whalen to discover possibly one of her best starting lineups: Powell, Hubbard, Adashcyk, Bello, Bello.

 

[CutDownTheNet]

It hurts depth having them out (as if Whalen would use any of her depth anyway), but having these two out might force Whalen to discover possibly one of her best starting lineups: Powell, Hubbard, Adashcyk, Bello, Bello.

The lineup @Shades mentions is the most likely lineup at this point against Michigan. If Brunson and Scalia are marginal, no sense risking making their injuries worse (and perhaps risking the rest of their seasons) by playing them prematurely.

Assuming Scalia and Brunson don’t start, then if either of them has a couple no-risk minutes in them, then one and/or the other might come off the bench so that the other guards can get some rest. If not, then we might need to play the 3 healthy guards 40 min each and hope they don’t foul out. Other option would be to burn a planned red shirt - for instance play Justice Ross.

In any event, it’s a good lineup. Powell has all of a sudden become a three-point shooter, and Masha is shooting the best from deep recently. Brunson can shoot from deep if open, but hasn’t really shot many lately, so for sake of argument, let’s call her a sure-thing-from-15 shooter. Then (and in spite of losing Pitts) we still have four good three-point shooters on the roster, shown below with their three-point shooting over the last 3 games (Wisconsin, Rutgers, Nebraska).

Powell 6-21 .286
Scalia 6-19 .316
Hubbard 7-20 .350
Adashchyk 3-6 .500

We still have 3/4 of these un-injured, thus 3 good shooting guards in the game, including our best-paint-penetrating point guard. Three is all we need, especially when paired with Twin Bellos. The last several games were won by a combination of rebounding plus three-point shooting.

You can achieve both of those goals in one game with this lineup. (Against most tall Big-Ten teams anyway) you can’t achieve both goals with a single post (at least not single-post for a full 40 min) - even if that post is Taiye, because then a tall opponent just double- and triple-teams her.

I agree this could be as good-as or better a lineup as we’ve had all year. And when Brunson and Scalia get healthy, Whalen will be less scared to go deeper into her bench.

(I don’t know if anybody noticed, but Wisconsin played 12 players to our 8. Although three of those were for 3-4 min each.)

 

[Ignatius L Hoops]

.286 is not a good three point percentage. Yes, I think Powell needs to keep shooting threes because she seems capable of knocking down three in a row from time to time; but right now she's closer to Mikayla Bailey's three point ability 19-70 (.271) in 2015-16 than she is to Banham .444, Wagner .366, Hedstrom .424 and Mullaney .351 in that same season.

Those are B1G season stats. Mullaney was 13-37. I forgot that Hedstrom was 25-59 and Wagner was 37-101.

 

[whalenfan]

.286 is not a good three point percentage. Yes, I think Powell needs to keep shooting threes because she seems capable of knocking down three in a row from time to time; but right now she's closer to Mikayla Bailey's three point ability 19-70 (.271) in 2015-16 than she is to Banham .444, Wagner .366, Hedstrom .424 and Mullaney .351 in that same season.

Those are B1G season stats. Mullaney was 13-37. I forgot that Hedstrom was 25-59 and Wagner was 37-101.

Shes been better lately, 13-39 from in the last 7 games, was 4-26 in the 1st 16 games. She's definitely more confident now.

 

[Shades]

Confidence (although she never seemed to lack) and better able to get into a rhythm not coming in cold off the bench.

 

[CutDownTheNet]

Shes been better lately, 13-39 from in the last 7 games, was 4-26 in the 1st 16 games. She's definitely more confident now.

I went back only 3 games, hoping to capture that “better lately” effect, but unfortunately those 3 included both an off night for Powell and one of Diva’s two-game mini-slump games. Powell’s 7-game .333 shooting is more typical as of late (thanks for that stat @whalenfan). Not a Scalia or a Pitts or a Banham, but still pretty decent as your 3rd option. Scalia is down from her more-recent .420-ish shooting in those recent 3 games too. Not a big enough sample, for sure.

Banham we all remember, but we sometimes forget how good a shooter Hedstrom was. I think Bailey was a better shooter in High School than college (I saw her play a few games back then).