The Middletown Press (Middletown, CT)
Maryland last obstacle
Only Terrapins stand in way of perfect 2016
COLLEGE PARK, MD. >> The first few days of 2016 found the members of the UConn women’s basketball team with no game to play and memories of a 62-point victory still fresh in their minds.
The months have come and gone, more victories have followed including many of the routine variety. Now there is one test remaining for the nation’s top-ranked team and for those who believe in saving the best for last, Thursday’s 6 p.m. game against No. 4 Maryland before a sellout crowd of more than 15,000 at the XFINITY Center should be well worth the wait.
“I think it the perfect way to bring it to an end,” UConn junior forward Gabby Williams said. “If it goes the way we want it to, I think that will be the cherry on top. It is not going to be easy and this whole out of conference (schedule) hasn’t been easy so why would we expect an easy game at the end of the year?”
Maryland leads the country in field goal percentage, rank second in rebounding margin and scoring margin.
A victory would put the finishing touches on a perfect 2016 with 39 games played and 39 games won for the Huskies. Just when it looked like there are no firsts for the new wave of UConn stars to set their sights on, a win would give UConn the most victories in a calendar year without a loss. UConn went 38-0 in 2009 and 2015 and 36-0 in 2002. The only time UConn won more games in a year came in 2010 when UConn posted a 40-1 mark.
The Terrapins feature a pair of senior stars.
Shatori Walker-Kimbrough ranks seventh on Maryland’s career scoring list with 1,697 points while Brionna Jones is 16th with 1,441 points. Jones is already second in career field-goal percentage and seventh in both rebounds and blocked shots. WalkerKimbrough is the career leader with a 46.1 3-point percentage, fifth with an 80.3 free-throw percentage, seventh with 131 3-pointers made and could crack the top 10 in steals as well. When Jones scores 19 more points she will team with Walker-Kimbrough to become the third set of classmates in Maryland women’s basketball history to each have at least 1,500 points.
“I think it is going to be a pretty tough matchup for us,” said Katie Lou Samuelson, UConn’s leading scorer. “There are a lot of different people we figure out how we are going to guard but that is how it’s been all season, we haven’t really been facing the best matchups ideally but we are also hard to guard. I think that they are going to come out ready to play and we are going to have to match whatever intensity they bring and bring it that much more.”
So just how challenging has the schedule been in December? this is just the 10th time in program history that the Huskies have played six ranked teams in a month and seven of those occurrences have come in March when playing a string of ranked opponents deep in the NCAA tournament is standard operating procedure. The only other times UConn has had six games against teams ranked in the Associated Press poll came in February, 2007 and February, 2011.
However, the only history on the Huskies’ minds is what transpired at Madison Square Garden on Dec. 28, 2015 when a spirited second-half comeback by the Terrapins fell short.
Jones was unstoppable down low with 12 points on 12 of 14 shooting. WalkerKimbrough had 14 points, five rebounds, three assists, two steals and three blocked shots while Kristen Confroy added 12 points and seven rebounds. All three are back and starting for the Terrapins.
If All-Americans Breanna Stewart and Morgan Tuck appeared powerless to stop Jones from getting low-post position, how will the Huskies’ undersized post players fare?
“Tuck is pretty strong and pretty physical and she couldn’t keep her out of the lane or do anything with her and Stewie just wasn’t physical enough, big enough to handle her,” UConn coach Geno Auriemma said. “We are probably in a similar situation this year, maybe Nat (Natalie Butler can match up physically) for a little bit but it is a really difficult matchup for us. We have played some great post players but I don’t know if we’ve faced anybody that big and that physical this year. She was very difficult last year and will be even more difficult this year because she is a year older and a little better.”
UConn has gone up against teams with more size in almost every game against ranked opponents this season. However, teams like Baylor, Texas and Ohio State failed to make it a point of trying to post up the smaller UConn forwards for long stretches. Auriemma doesn’t expect Maryland to make it that easy to defend Jones.
“I think that is the best strategy for them is to keep doing what they’ve been doing,” Auriemma said. “They are not going to change what they do just because of us. They didn’t have any problem going after Stewie and Tuck and we don’t have nearly that. I can’t imagine that they are going to do anything different. Watching them on film, they are way more athletic, they remind me a lot of Ohio State, they get to the free throw line a lot. Kimbrough is one of the best shooters in the country, she might be one of the best players in the country so it is not like they are a one-dimensional team and they are at home so there is nothing I can think of where I go ‘yeah, we have a huge advantage in this one.’ It is not going to be easy.”