Purdue/Duquesne
- Thread starter Russ Ford
- Start date
21-15 Purdue 4:30 left in the second. Mary Ashley hitting a few jumpers. It amazes me how someone as small as Ellis always manages to get several points in the paint.
Boilers with a 29-22 lead at half. Ellis and Stevenson with 11 points each. Stevenson 6 rebounds also.
Both teams get one shot and one shot only. Virtually no offensive rebounds the whole game. Boilers up 9 with 6.5 minutes left in the 3rd. Terry 3 fouls.
Boilers win 71-50. Dukes shoot 28%. Ellis 15, Smith 15, Swanson 14, Stevenson 13 pts. Terry zero pts, but 11 rebounds. 33 points from the bench. Nice.
Great 2nd half! Pretty much everyone contributed. Jayla Smith had a really nice run in the 3rd and 4th. She's starting to get her confidence back. Great to see!
Smith two double digit games…does it mean anything going forward? She has talent, would be nice to see her have a nice Sr year.
I had something to do tonight, so just now seeing the box score. Smith backed up the good game against Butler with another good game, so I am taking that as a positive. I am really really loving Swanson's game as she gets healthier and more reps. She could end up being great. Mary Ashley is just solid and dependable, rarely gets over 15, just as rarely doesn't score at least 8.
Duquesne couldn't hit a trailer park with a tornado. Maybe good defense? 13 turnovers not bad for us. A couple came right at the end.
I was at the game! First one in 10 years. Was traveling to my folks for the holiday weekend, so I took the 2-hour detour to the old stomping ground.
Ellis and Stevenson definitely drove the train, but Sophie Swanson had a nice second half. She stepped into a couple beautiful 3s. Jayla Smith made strong contributions as well. Purdue basically controlled the game after a stagnant stretch for both teams at the end of the 1st and early 2nd quarters.
Duquesne is no B1G team, but they did win 20-win games in a respectable mid-major conference.
Crowd looked bigger than the reported 2500, to me anyway.
Ellis and Stevenson definitely drove the train, but Sophie Swanson had a nice second half. She stepped into a couple beautiful 3s. Jayla Smith made strong contributions as well. Purdue basically controlled the game after a stagnant stretch for both teams at the end of the 1st and early 2nd quarters.
Duquesne is no B1G team, but they did win 20-win games in a respectable mid-major conference.
Crowd looked bigger than the reported 2500, to me anyway.
OMG I laughed way too hard at the trailer park joke..... That was great and I WILL steal that....
Honestly it looks like the 3 BT teams are the class of this tournament. Like us UWisc is already into the round of 8 and I suspect UMinn will punch their ticket today. Colgate may be the toughest non- BT team left in play.
I am disappointed that Mila fell right back to her lazy play and made very little positive impact on the game. She has a lot of work to do in the off-season if she wants to play a lot next year.
Lower bowl holds 4k only, so if you can see empty spaces in those seast, 2.5 k is probably right.
Smith is averaging 13 ppg so far this tournament. Exactly what I said she needed average on the season for us to be successful. Of course this is coming against middle of the pack mid major teams. So, the grain of salt is huge when it comes to this stat line.
She would be an all conference performer at a A10 school. Something for her to consider. But I’m expecting her back.
She would be an all conference performer at a A10 school. Something for her to consider. But I’m expecting her back.
I'm not counting her back into next year's rotating YET, but if she carries this the next the games and works hard in the off-season to shore up her weaknesses, I'd start her instead of Jones next year. Mila to me is still outside looking in for pt next year, Alaina is showing flashes of some aggression and could be a decent 10 minute a game post if we don't get one from the portal.l and she progresses over the summer.
Though I wasn't real complementary about this tournament, I have to say it may end up being more than a good boost for the player's minds, especially Miss Smith. I think you add in that one player opted out and it gave more minutes for others, maybe leading to a blessing in disguise. I'm thinking this alignment may sit well with the players meshing together now also. If someone was thinking of portaling, they may think different now. Just some thoughts from an idle mind.
I feel like I’m being overly negative about this situation - and I truly hope a light has gone on for Smith and she has a great senior year for us and goes out with a bang. Truly, that would be great.
But I’m just trying to be realistic here. We were saying the same thing this time last year after Smith’s strong BTT (and game winner). It’s literally the same situation as last year and everyone was hoping smith would step up and be a double digit scorer for us and help us recover from the loss of Petree and Hardin.
She turns around and averages a pathetic 3 ppg. It all seems like ground hogs day to me. There are gamers and then there are players who only thrive when the pressure is off. She seems like the latter.
I'm cautiously optimistic, but she has to play this way the rest of this tournament or I'm back completely off the band wagon for her. But I totally get where you are coming from and don't disagree.
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