WBB: Ags blow out UCA in a double-header that wasn’t

The Women’s Bouncy Ball team improved to 6-2 with a win over overmatched Central Arkansas. The Ags stifled an opponent to start the game for the second outing in a row as the Sugar Bears opened the first quarter with miss/blocked shot, miss, turnover, turnover, before Kamry Orr got them on the scoreboard with 7:32 to go in the first to make it 8-2. Central Arkansas would only score one more bucket for the rest of the quarter, which ended at 23-4 despite Coach Blair giving his bench lots of court time after a mass substitution with 5:14 left in the 1st and a 15-2 lead.

For the rest of the game, the pattern was to put the starters in to start the quarter and then pull most of them to give more minutes to the bench. The lead at halftime was 41-12. It was 63-23 after the third and it was clear that Coach was using the game to work on specific things on offense and defense. A&M held the Sugar Bears to 4 points in the final period as well as in the first. By the end of the game, Central Arkansas was running down the clock on offense.

The starters ended up playing between 19-26 minutes each. Sham Washington played 20 off the bench; seven different bench players had double digit minutes, and only Lauren Harrison who played the final 2, didn’t score.

• 57 points was the largest margin of victory since an 88-30 win over Prairie View in 2015
• Kayla Wells led the Ags with 15 points ni 19 minutes.
• Chennedy Carter had 14 points and 7 assists.
• Ciera Johnson had a double-double with 12 points and 12 boards
• Caylinne Martin 10 points off the bench (career high).
• A&M outrebounded UCA 50-30.
• Kamry Orr led the Sugar Bears with 10 pts. Hannah Langhi led them in rebounds with 7 off the bench.

Up Next

• UC Riverside and #8 Oregon State
• Maui Jim Maui Classic
• 9:30PM CST Dec 14 and 11:30PM CST Dec15, 2018
• Lahaina Civic Center Lahaina,, Maui, HI
• No TV or stream that I could find. Radio 1150AM

Given the late tips, the short turnaround, and the lack of video, I’m going to preview both of next weekend’s games here.

UC Riverside

The Highlanders play in the Big West and go into the game with a 2-6 record. Last year they were 11-22 overall and lost in the conference semifinals to the Aggies of UC-Davis. They lost their best player from that team, guard Michelle Curry, to graduation. Riverside has played a pretty tough non-conference schedule, with losses to major conference schools USC, BYU, Oklahoma State, and #3 Oregon.

• #20 5-11 Sr F Malou De Kergret leads the team at 11.1 ppg. She had some big scoring games against USC(17 pts) and BYU (16 pts) but was shut out by Oklahoma State.
• #2 6-2 Jr F Marina Ewodo scores 10.3 ppg and leads in assists.
• #3 5-10 So G Tianna Eaton leads the team in rebounding at 7/g and adds 9.8 ppg.
• #14 6-0 RS Jr G Jannon Otto averages 8.6 ppg. Otto averaged 8.7 last season after sitting out the 16-17 season after transferring from New Mexico.
• #10 5-9 So G Keilanei Cooper averages 8.4 ppg

Head Coach John Margaritis has been at UCR since 2004. He was associate HC at N. Arizona before getting the HC job at UCR. Before that he had been coaching at various NAIA and DII schools since 1981. He led the Highlanders to an NCAA berth in 2006, 2007, and 2010. They were Big West regular season champs in 2015-16.

Oregon State

The #8 Beavers are 6-1 as I write this with two games to play before they face the Ags. They’ve beaten S. Carolina and their one loss is to #2 Notre Dame. Both of those came in the Vancouver Showcase in late November. The Beavers built a 14 point lead on the Irish in the 2nd quarter and were up 7 at half. Notre Dame whittled it down in the 3rd quarter and took the lead in the beginning of the 4th. Oregon State would hang in there until about 4 minutes to go, when ND went on a 12-2 run.

Oregon State has been on a great run under HC Scott Rueck, who was hired from DIII George Fox in 2010. Last year they went 26-8, eliminating both Tennessee and Baylor from the NCAA tournament before losing to Louisville in the E8. They lost in the S16 to Florida State in 2017 to finish 31-5. In 2016 they were 32-5 after they lost to UConn in the Final Four, knocking off Baylor in the E8. In each of those years observers questioned whether Oregon State could do well after losing key seniors. In 2016 they graduated All-American Hon Mention Ruth Hamblin and All-American Jamie Weisner. In 2017 they graduated All-American Sydney Wiese. Last season was the senior year for All-American center Marie Gulich.

This season’s likely starters for vs the Ags:

• #24 RS So PG Destiny Slocum sat out last season after transferring from Maryland, where she was freshman of the year in the B1G and in one national award (WBCA). It’s thought that her transfer after being the starter for the Terps is related to wanting to be closer to her home in Idaho. She’s leading the team with a 15.4 ppg average with 41 assists in 7 games.
• #0 5-10 Jr G Mikayla Pivec does everything: She is second in scoring with 14.6 ppg and leads the team in rebounding at 8.9/game. She leads the team in steals and blocked shots and is second in assists..
• #5 6-3 So F Taya Corosdale averages 6.9 ppg and 5.9 rebounds/g. She started the last 25 games as a freshman.
• #10 6-2 Sr G Katie McWilliams averages 10 ppg, She started every game last year and was all-conference honorable mention both for the team and the defensive team.
• #3 6-1 Jr G/F Maddie Washington is listed here as a likely starter just because she started OSU’s last outing. She’s started one game this season and started 9 times last season.

This will be billed as a battle of the last two freshmen of the year at PGs between Carter and Slocum. But Slocum’s team has more experience and is deeper - all but one player on the roster averages double-digit minutes and only Pivec is above 30 min/game (30.1) - so it is also a major challenge for the rest of the team. Rueck has said that he wants the Beavers to rebound better.