This One Goes to Eleven - Monday Cardinal Couple

Basketball Extends Their Streak

Where to start with this one?

  
With apologies to Maria von Trappe, maybe the end is the very best place to start for this game.

First off, it's a win, it goes in the win column and extends the Women's Basketball win streak to 11 which is one louder, innit?

The final score of 92-90 surely surprised people who may have given up on this game about halfway through when the NC State Wolfpack were leading the Cards 50-36.  No Cards made it to double digit scoring the first half, though Myisha Hines-Allen and Mariya Moore had seven, while Arica Carter and Asia Durr had eight.  The various stats were roughly even in the first half, but the important numbers were in the 2nd quarter where NCState hit 75% of their field goals and over 70% of their 3 point shots.  The Wolfpack also had a bit of an advantage from the free throw line as well, although the 67% for the Cards isn't awful from the charity stripe.

The Cards, after digging themselves into a significant halftime hole, started to chip away that lead, winning the 3rd quarter by seven points, and making up the other nine points for the two point win in the fourth quarter.  Whatever Coach Walz told the team at halftime worked, at least on the defensive end, holding NC State to only two made field goals and no 3 pointers whatsoever in the 3rd quarter.  The Cards weren't sowing the seeds of love, but were sowing the seeds of the end-game foul troubles, sending the Wolfpack to the line a whopping 13 times in the 3rd quarter on a very concerning 11 committed fouls.  The stats that really shifted in the Cards favor in the 3rd quarter were point in the paint (10-2), and points off turnovers (8-1 on five Pack turnovers)

Scary though the foul trouble situation may have been, it's a formula that worked.  More of the same in the 4th quarter where NC State got 20 free throw attempts on 12 fouls.  Overall, the Cards committed 35 fouls to NC State's 23.  The striped crew may have been a bit whistle happy, but in general I think it was a reasonably called game.  Both teams, in scouting the other, decided that good lock-down defense was the way to go, and that tends to result in more fouls.  The points off turnovers helped UofL with 12 on six NC State turnovers.

The real story in this one was in the final countdown, where NC State started out up five points coming off a pair of made free throws.  Dakota Weatherford, who only got a few minutes of playing time, but they were important minutes put up 3-point attempt, Hines-Allen got the rebound and fired a desperation-looking 3-point attempt that missed where the rebound went back to Weatherford, now practically under the basket and dropped the shot in.  The foul on the shot sent her sliding across the court thanks to the contact from the much larger Wolfpack player.  She wasn't able to convert on the and-one.

Weatherford was whistled for a near-phantom foul on the rebound attempt, and NC State was able to put the lead back out to five with 25 seconds left.

 Coach Walz used his final timeout, which, thanks to the new rules, advanced the ball to the hash mark and Asia Durr was able to bury a three on the inbounds play.  A sloppy inbounds attempt from NC State resulted in Mariya Moore having the ball and she was fouled going to the basket.  The reliable Moore, who had a career best 31 points in the game, made both free throws to tie the game for the first time since the first quarter.  NC State used their final time out to advance the ball to the hashmark.  After burning a few seconds of clocking looking for the last shot, Attack Yorkie Dakota Weatherford forced the tie-up.  With the possession arrow in Louisville's favor, the Cards got the ball with 4.1 seconds on the clock.  A lapse by NC State, they didn't put anyone on the ball on the inbounds, so Mariya Moore was able to let it bounce nearly to half court before touching it and thus starting the clock.  The NC State defense, coming to force Moore to take the ball and start the clock then fouled Moore at the half court line, putting her back on the line with a tie ballgame and 2.9 second on the clock.  The sophomore was ice ice baby, draining both giving UofL a two point lead.  NC State, with the last second desperation heave falling short went down to defeat.

FRED

So, "What did the Cards do right?"  Said Fred.

Free Throws, the most objective part of our FRED grading system are in capital "F" territory with a solid 76%, with the bulk of that stat being thanks to Mariya Moore's 8 of 10.

As for Rebounding, I think we're going to have to stretch to award a lower case "r" this one as the Wolfpack outrebounded the Cards 34-30.  Still awarding the lower case because 30 is a pretty good rebounding number, but I can't in good conscience award the upper-case when the other team gets more.

We'll give a capital "E" for Easy like Sunday morning, even though it was an afternoon game with UofL winning the points in the paint battle 32-24.

And lastly Defense only gets the lower-case "d" in my judgement.  We knew NC State was a 3 point shooting team, and yet in the first half, the Cards defense definitely did not get that message and go after the shooters outside the arc.  The second half was better, and Louisville won the turnover stat with only 11 TOs to the Wolfpack's 17, which is a key metric in my mind for this measure.  The 2nd half gets the "d" awarded, but without the first half effort to match, we can't make it upper case (the TO numbers were 7-6 in NC State's favor in the first half)

What We Liked

Mariya Moore, with 31 points and 7 assists, combined with an 11 point and 5 assist effort at Virginia, may have just played her way in a second ACC Player of the Week honor in this young year.

• Attack Yorkie Dakota Weatherford didn't play a significant number of minutes, but she did have a significant impact in her minutes, with a crucial put-back and a critical defensive tie-up to get the ball back for the Cards.  This in addition to a very good defensive effort.
• Arica Carter continues to have solid contributions. While she fouled out, she was only one of a number of players that fouled out of this game, and she did get 13 points before she went to the bench for the final time.  She ran the offense effectively, and continues to just play solid ball.  I do believe she is in the cat-bird's seat to get my most improved player accolades at the end of the season
• Asia Durr put up 19, which would normally put her in game-high scoring territory but misses out on it only because Moore had such a stand-out game.  Again, some critical great play down the final stretch showed remarkably poise for a freshman.

JMcA

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