Mountaineers Face No. 1 UConn
January 10, 2009 12:42 PM | General
By Steve Stone for MSNsportsNET.com
January 10, 2008
GAME NOTES
MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – The West Virginia University women’s basketball team prepares for a tough test as it faces top-ranked Connecticut on Saturday at 7 p.m. in the WVU Coliseum.
The Mountaineers (10-4, 0-2 Big East) are coming off another hard-luck defeat at the hands of Cincinnati, falling to the Bearcats 61-55. Considering it has already faced its share of difficult opponents, perhaps there will be no greater challenge this season then having the undefeated Huskies (14-0, 1-0 Big East) in town.
“We want to come out and compete,” Coach Mike Carey said. “We don’t want to come out and back down, we want to compete and play hard.”
WVU hopes to rebound from its cold-shooting spell that plagued the Mountaineers in their home loss to Cincinnati. Guard Liz Repella led the team with 18 points, extending her double-figure scoring to 13 straight games.
Senior Takisha Granberry and sophomore Sarah Miles each had 14 points, but found it difficult to penetrate inside while settling for outside and mid-range jumpers. Carey believes that his squad will begin to mark its improvement once its offensive philosophy becomes centered on attacking the basket.
“We’re hoping we’ll start attacking the rim and get to the foul line. We need to start attacking and start taking them off the dribble,” Carey said. “When we did take Cincinnati off the dribble we’d get some good looks but we missed those too. When you are not hitting threes, you’ve got to start attacking off the dribble. You’ve got to start trying to get to the rim and to the foul line.”
The Huskies are a team that is adept from both the inside and outside. Sophomore standout Maya Moore leads Connecticut with 18.5 points per game while shooting nearly 55 percent from the field. The reigning Big East Player of the Year notched a game-high 25 points in last season’s victory over WVU.
WVU must find a way to contain junior center Tina Charles in the post. The Jamaica, N.Y., native and 2008 All-Big East First Team member is having another superb season with averages of 17.1 points and a team-leading 9.1 rebounds per game.
Connecticut is coming off a convincing 83-37 rout over USF, its first conference victory in as many games. The Huskies, which boast another double-figure scorer in senior guard Renee Montgomery, are beating their opponents by an average margin of 43.6 points.
“Even when I came into the league in my first year – when Connecticut went undefeated – I think this team is better than that team,” Carey admitted. “I think they have more scorers and are solid. They get great point guard play with (Renee) Montgomery and are a very good team.”
Despite their two-game slide in conference play, the Mountaineers are 3-2 in their last five contests. Picking up some quality nonconference wins prior to Big East play, WVU will try to right its ship during the mid-season and bolster its tournament résumé.
Another hardship in the beginning of conference play is the consistency of games played, let alone in the toughest women’s basketball conference in the country. WVU plays its third Big East game in six days when the Huskies visit Morgantown, which occurs at a time when the Mountaineers are playing with a six and seven player rotation.
“It’s tough, but everybody in the country is going through the same thing,” Carey said of his club’s string of games. “We can’t use that as an excuse, we just have to get ready to play and have the same effort night in and night out. We’re not good enough to make mistakes, we’re not good enough not to play hard, we’re not good enough to come out and just stand around.”
Saturday night’s game will be televised by WVPBS and is deemed “Dairy Mart Dollar Day,” where fans can visit any Morgantown area Dairy Mart to pick up a coupon good for one dollar admission to the game.
