Women’s Basketball: UL women march into WBI semifinals

Kevin Foote, The Advertiser, March 19, 2016

 

UL guard Kia Wilridge looks for an opening in the Stetson defense in Earl K. Long Gym in the WBI Quarterfinals on Saturday night.(Photo: John Rowland/Special to The Advertiser)

 

 

The UL Ragin’ Cajuns didn’t know much about the Stetson Hatters when they began preparing for Saturday’s WBI quarterfinal round matchup at E.K. Long Gym.

One of the first things they noticed was that Stetson’s backcourt may have been ripe for the picking.

Problem is, fullcourt pressure defense is typically more effective after made shots, and coach Garry Brodhead’s Cajuns weren’t making many early on.

In fact, UL missed its first 14 attempts and only one of its first 18 tries from the field.

Still, though, the Cajuns were forcing turnovers. And once the shots started falling, the Cajuns were able to overcome an early 14-2 deficit and cruise to a 56-47 victory over the Hatters.

With the win, the Cajuns will now meet Youngstown State at 5 p.m. Wednesday in the Cajundome. Youngstown State defeated Maryland-Baltimore Country 67-48 on Saturday behind 15 3-pointers.

"We couldn’t make any shots early and we got frustrated," Brodhead said. "We had some good shots early. They just didn’t fall. Then I thought we started taking some bad shots. And our defense got worse as well."

As it turned out, there were three solutions. The first was Sylvana Okde, who came off the bench to hit 3-pointers with 4:23 and 2;51 left in the second period to keep the Cajuns close at 20-12.

"When we fell behind early, I was getting myself ready mentally to come into the game and contribute," Okde said. "As a team, I thought we’d shoot it better. I can’t really explain it. Stuff happens, I guess."

Okde would later hit another big 3-pointer with 5:59 left to play to give UL a 50-43 lead at the time to finish with 12 points.

"Sylk really opened things up for us a little bit when we weren’t hitting anything," Brodhead said.

At the half, UL was shooting 17.6 percent and only trailing 26-19.

"I thought we’d shoot it better here since we practice here all the time, but the goals are different for the games, so maybe that was it, I don’t know," said Kia Wilridge, who finished with nine points, four rebounds, two assists and five steals.

"It was frustrating. The Cajundome doesn’t have a backdrop. It has one here, but we just weren’t hitting any shots. We noticed on film that their guards weren’t the best ball handlers, so we really wanted to make it a fast pace."

After having just two points on 0-of-11 shooting from the field in the first half, Keke Veal became the second fix when she turned it on in the third quarter with a pair of 3-pointers and an old-fashioned three-point play in a 13-point quarter to ignite a 24-9 edge in that period.

It got scary, though, with 7:10 left to play when Veal went down with an apparent ankle injury.

"I think she stepped on somebody’s foot," Brodhead said. "It looked bad at first. I thought was it was bad, but Keke’s tough."

She later returned to make two free throws to ice the win, finishing with a game-high 17 points, along with six rebounds and two steals.

By the game’s end, the original plan of forcing turnovers ended up working like a charm with 28 turnovers, compared to only 11 for UL.