no travel away from home this week for the Women
Later today, the Women Bulldogs will host the San Diego Toreros in their second match of the season. Prior to first game on December 21st between these teams, the Zags looked like a team on the brink of either figuring it out or watching their season slip away. While the Bulldogs did defeat the Toreros, it wasn’t in particularly convincing fashion and they would go on to lose their next match against Oregon State in heartbreaking fashion so things were looking a little bleak.
However, since then the Zags have looked stout as they’ve rolled off 9 wins in a row and come into tonight’s matchup with a 13-8 (8-2) record on the campaign and hold a narrow lead in the West Coast Conference with teams like Portland and Saint Mary’s sitting at 7-3 in conference play. The Bulldogs looks to have gelled well and I believe we’re watching a group of players hitting their stride at a good time in the season.
On the flip side, the Toreros sit at 4-15 with two of those coming against non-Division 1 opponents and have yet to win a conference game thus far. The situation for longtime head coach Cindy Fisher and her team looks rough heading into this matchup, at least on paper.
In the WCC, San Diego sits last in three point attempts with just over 12 per game, last in three point efficiency at 24.5%, second to last in free throw percentage at 69.1%, third highest in turnovers at 17, and they lead the conference in fouls per game at 19.6. That’s…well, let’s just say that’s not very nice to look at on the stat sheet. Unlike Gonzaga, San Diego is a team that wants to shoot the ball within 15 feet of the basket as evidenced by their conference-leading 48 two point shots per game, fight for their rebounds of which they grab a respectable 37.8 per game, and try to bully you out of the game.
That strategy worked to some degree in the last contest against the Zags as only Yvonne Ejim really left her mark on the game by finishing with 28 points while Maud Huijbens was the only other Zag to secure double-digit points with her 10. Honestly, if the Toreros didn’t crap out in the second quarter with just 8 points, which was basically half of their point totals in the other periods, they may have had a chance to secure the upset.
Given that the first match felt like such a tight game against an opponent with such dreadful numbers on paper, I’m sure the coaching staff will be pushing the Zag players to show up confident, willing to exploit their opposition, and to secure the dang ball given that the Bulldogs coughed up 27 turnovers in the last game. Thankfully, the team is coming off an impressive performance against Pepperdine in which they only committed 9 turnovers, a season high and first time they didn’t crack 10 or more. Hopefully this means that players like Allie Turner and Ines Bettencourt won’t drop 5 turnovers a piece tonight.
Something else that I’m sure will be highlighted by the staff heading into this matchup will be their three-point shooting. Last time against Sab Diego, Gonzaga only shot 8 threes and while they made 4 of those attempts, this was by far and away the fewest amount of deep balls that the Zags had shot in a match as the second lowest at this stage in the season was 14 in the early season victory against Wyoming. Given that this team averages 20.1 per game and knocks them down effectively at 36.2%, a number that ranks first in the WCC and 26th nationally, the Bulldogs have to shoot the deep ball more against the Toreros.
There have been no formal updates on the status of senior Maud Huijbens’ concussion that has forced her to miss the last three games. The closest to an update comes in the form of a recent Spokesman article in which I’ll share this quote: “Gonzaga coach Lisa Fortier was asked if Huijben’s concussion issue is anything like the issue that forced her to miss seven games two seasons ago. Fortier dismissed the thought quickly, but evaluating concussions has proven to be tricky.” Given that Maud was the only player outside of Ejim doing much against the Toreros last time, I’m hoping that we get the return of the Dutch woman.
Hit the comment thread below to share your thoughts on the game as it unfolds!