Lady Topper Hoops: Tops Fall at Louisville, 75–56. Defense Much Improved
Last Night, Western Kentucky Women’s Basketball opened up the season against a top ten Louisville (1–0) for the second season in a row.
Last Night, Western Kentucky Women’s Basketball opened up the season against a top ten Louisville (1–0) for the second season in a row.
This season, WKU (0–1) was much more respectable defensively. Last year, Western gave up 104 in its first outing against the Cards, and easily could have given up 115 or more and lost by at least 30. They didn’t, and to their credit, they did score 80 against a top-five team last season.
This season, WKU’s historically bad defense is much improved. WKU only allowed 75 points against a high-powered Louisville team. The defense kept them in it, cutting it to single digits in the third quarter before being swamped by 11 the rest of the game to lose by 19.
WKU showed some fight in the first quarter. Despite being fairly outmatched size and skill-wise, the Lady Toppers held tough with Louisville, 21–13 in the first despite Louisville hitting its first seven shots. Western really nailed it down and dug in for the second quarter, only losing the quarter 13–12, good for a 52 point paced quarter and allowed the Lady Tops to go into the break with serious hope of an upset.
Louisville took firm control in the third, leading by as many as 16, but a late surge brought the Lady Toppers within single digits at 51–43 with 2:28 remaining. However, Louisville finished on a 4–0 in the last 1:22 of the third to make the 4th quarter much more straightforward.
Louisville carried its momentum into the 4th quarter, leading by as much as 23 before the final margin settled at 19.
Ultimately, what happened was what was expected: A top ten team blew out an unranked mid-major.
However, there is more to this story:
Western Kentucky allowed 70.7 points per game last year, but more telling, early in the year, Western just couldn’t keep anyone in the country from scoring under 80 points. WKU allowed 80 in each of its first four games last season, and also allowed 75 in an exhibition match-up. Western is already showing a bucking of that trend, not allowing more than 75 in its first two games (including exhibition).
Until its last few games, WKU was averaging well into the 70s in points per game, something that was flirting with an all-time record for points given up in a season. That is a horrifying record to flirt with, something that had not been broached since before Paul Sanderford.
WKU has now calmed that issue down, now playing more reasonable defense, and the offense needs to pick up and the Lady Toppers could be a pretty formidable opponent for anyone. With early-season jitters and lack of chemistry, Western seems to already be better than it was well into December last season.
The Lady Tops return nearly all of their production, not losing a single player that started a single game in 2018–19. The only major difference between last year’s team and this season’s team thus far is the absence of sharpshooter Alexis Brewer. Alexis is still recovering from several injuries sustained in the off-season.
WKU has struggled to score from beyond the arc thus far in 2019–20, possibly because the Lady Tops miss Brewer’s abilities.
However, there can be no questioning the production, and although the margin was similar, scoring in the 70s to compete with a Power Five is much more achievable than needing to score in the 90s. Western’s defense is much improved.
WKU still boasts a stout starting lineup in Raneem Elgedawy, Dee Givens, Meral Abdelgawad, Sherry Porter, and Whitney Creech, while adding significant talent in Sandra Skinner, Myriah Haywood, and Fatou Pouye, among others off the bench.
Next time out, the Lady Tops get Mercer on the road Friday at 3:30 Central Time, a team picked to finish first in their conference and a regular NCAA Tournament participant. WKU last faced Mercer in the Georgia State Thanksgiving Tournament in 2017–18, defeating the Bears 67–62 on November 24, 2017.