MADISON – Sunday, the Wisconsin women’s basketball team opened the Big Ten season with a victory over No. 20 Michigan State for its first win over a ranked opponent in almost three years.
Wednesday, Dec. 10, the Badgers returned to action with a non-conference game that included an 11 a.m. tip off.
Talk about a test of a team’s mental fortitude.
“Coach always talks about how we do anything is how we do everything, whether that’s how we show up in practice or in the classroom, or how we act towards fans and stuff like that,” graduate guard Shay Bollin said. “She really challenges us to treat every game with the same standards, no matter who we’re playing against, and I think, for us, we just had to be really intentional about that today.”
The approach worked. UW scored a 74-46 victory over San Diego at the Kohl Center to improve to 7-0 at home and 8-3 overall heading into exam week.
Senior guard Destiny Howell finished with 14 points on 6-for-10 shooting. Three other Badgers reached double figures: Bollin (11 points), senior guard Ronnie Porter (10 points plus four assists) and senior forward Gift Uchenna (10 points and six rebounds). Junior guard Kyrah Daniels had eight points and a career-high five steals.
Sophomore guard Kylie Ray finished with 17 points for San Diego, which dropped to 4-7.
Here are three takeaways from the win.
Badgers’ decision making remains sharp
The Toreros don’t pressure the ball the way Michigan State does, but UW’s season-low 10 assists should not be disregarded. San Diego’s first 10 opponents averaged almost 17 turnovers per game.
The Badgers’ ability to be smart with the ball helped them overcome their third-lowest shooting percentage of the season (38.5%). There were few empty possessions and it made a difference. This was their first win while shooting below 40%.
Senior guard Ronnie Porter, who had one turnover in 33 ½ minutes Sunday, had just one in 24 minutes Wednesday. Howell, who had a team-high three Sunday, made just one in 24 minutes.
“Definitely just playing with more confidence and poise,” Howell said. “I think that trusting in our abilities to be able to take care of the ball is definitely starting to affect all five of us.
“Not saying that we didn’t trust in each other or our own abilities before, but I think that as the games have kept going on, that confidence and that trust is only going to keep growing.”
UW reasserts itself in third quarter
The Badgers led by 14 after one quarter, but San Diego zoned the Badgers in the second quarter and held them to 3-for-16 shooting (18.8%) to cut the lead 35-24 at the half. The third quarter was the Badgers’ best of the day.
They scored the first 13 points of the half, held San Diego to 3-for-9 shooting and hit 60% (9 for 15) of their shots. The beauty of the run was that it included buckets from seven players. No one had more than five points or three shots.
UW coach Robin Pingeton points to the team’s increased level of defensive intensity during that stretch. Howell thought she and her teammates’ improved ball movement sparked better results.
“Our shot selection wasn’t the best, and the only way we were going to get out of that was just moving the ball, trusting each other,” Howell said. “That was one of the points that coach made at halftime, was being able to trust each other. That’s not really a problem. I think we just weren’t being mindful of that, and we weren’t being intentional behind that, so coming out into the third quarter definitely showed.”
UW knows how to cater to its audience
The matchup marked UW’s annual Education Day, which allows Madison elementary and middle school students to catch a game.
The result was the loudest home game of the season. The loudest cheer came when a Bollin steal led to a layup by sophomore Jovana Spasovski to give UW a 67-39 lead with 4 minutes 52 seconds to play.
The bucket sent the mostly student-filled arena on its ear. Without going into the whole 6-7 phenomena – feel free to Google it – hitting 67 points was a high point of the afternoon and the kind of moment you get when the arena is filled with kids.
As for the Badgers, it was clear that they were trying to hit 67 points. It started with four straight 3-point misses. After junior guard Laci Steele hit one free throw (and missed the second) the stage was set.
“It was funny because I was taking the ball out, and the kids were yelling from the sidelines, 22, 22!,” Bollin said, referring to her jersey number. “They were like, ‘We need two more points, we need two more points, so I think it was more important to them than it was for us, but we were really excited, too, that we were able to get them that moment.”
This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Three takeaways from Wisconsin women’s 74-46 win over San Diego in matinee
Reporting by Mark Stewart, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel / Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
