Women's Billikens Basketball

[slufanskip]

1 hour ago, billikenfan05 said:

That looked like a good Colgate team. This women’s team feels a lot like the Majerus teams in that they don’t light the world on fire offensively but man do they shut down on defense..

side note:

Kendra Wilken bringing offensive boards below her waist, power dribbling, taking it back up and getting blocked is enough to make me walk away from the TV.

plus this quote from you a few games ago  "Wilken is not a scorer by any stretch of the imagination" makes it seem like you're not being very fair

Maybe she brought it down a couple of times, but she's averaging 11.5 ppg while shooting 50% from the field and 82% from the line. Plus she's averaging 2 t/o per game so she's not turning it over and shooting 50% from the field which is over 13% better than any other big. 

Rachel Kent failed to score in double figures for the 1st time in 6 games as a D1 player. Even after going just 2/8 from 3, she's still shooting 47% from 3. She went 1-2 from the line near the end to end up with 9 points. 

[kmbilliken]

2 hours ago, thetorch said:

Lady Bills pick up another win over Colgate this afternoon.  Wilken led with 15 points and 9 boards.  Ciaja had 14 and 5 assists.  Billikens shot it very poorly, 36% but held Colgate to just 31% from the field.  Harbison continues to struggle from the field, 5-16.  Smith-Traore chipped in 9 points and 11 boards.  Flowers had just 11 minutes off the bench.  Like Thatch she is the mystery player for them.  Billikens a solid 5-1 thus far with with an interesting slate of local schools coming up next, @SIUC, home against SEMO, @Mizzou and at home against Illinois St.

I think Flowers is getting less minutes because she is being outplayed by Wilkins and Smith- Traore. She is still productive when she plays and is helping them win. It puts the women in a good position to have three capable front court players.

[RUBillsFan]

First, I’m an MBM when it comes to women’s basketball.  Second, I understand that perhaps we needed the starters to play big minutes for the win today, but it (again) seems like Stone is leaning too heavily on just a few players.  Kent (a freshman) played all 40 minutes today.  Harbison played 39 and Smith-Traore played 37.  I’ve felt in the past Stone has done this and it’s come back to bite the team late in the year.  This team feels like it has more depth than she’s ever had, but we’re seeing the same thing in terms of a very short rotation and a few players being used very heavily.

[billikenfan05]

51 minutes ago, slufanskip said:

plus this quote from you a few games ago  "Wilken is not a scorer by any stretch of the imagination" makes it seem like you're not being very fair

Maybe she brought it down a couple of times, but she's averaging 11.5 ppg while shooting 50% from the field and 82% from the line. Plus she's averaging 2 t/o per game so she's not turning it over and shooting 50% from the field which is over 13% better than any other big. 

Rachel Kent failed to score in double figures for the 1st time in 6 games as a D1 player. Even after going just 2/8 from 3, she's still shooting 47% from 3. She went 1-2 from the line near the end to end up with 9 points. 

She brings it down almost every time. I’m not being unfair. She is an excellent defender and rebounder but is tough to watch on offense, especially after catching an o-reb.

[slufanskip]

19 minutes ago, RUBillsFan said:

First, I’m an MBM when it comes to women’s basketball.  Second, I understand that perhaps we needed the starters to play big minutes for the win today, but it (again) seems like Stone is leaning too heavily on just a few players.  Kent (a freshman) played all 40 minutes today.  Harbison played 39 and Smith-Traore played 37.  I’ve felt in the past Stone has done this and it’s come back to bite the team late in the year.  This team feels like it has more depth than she’s ever had, but we’re seeing the same thing in terms of a very short rotation and a few players being used very heavily.

This game was close until the final qtr

[RUBillsFan]

3 minutes ago, slufanskip said:

This game was close until the final qtr

Right.  I wasn’t just talking about this game.  We beat SIUE by 33, but Kent still played 36 minutes.

[slufanskip]

24 minutes ago, RUBillsFan said:

Right.  I wasn’t just talking about this game.  We beat SIUE by 33, but Kent still played 36 minutes.

I'd probably tend to agree with you

[Pistol]

11 hours ago, billikenfan05 said:

She brings it down almost every time. I’m not being unfair. She is an excellent defender and rebounder but is tough to watch on offense, especially after catching an o-reb.

This drives me crazy. This is something traditional bigs should have eliminated from their game by mid-HS.

Wilken is an interesting player. Slow as molasses, plodding, and methodical. She has a knack for being in the right place at the right time, but it's exhausting watching her operate in slow motion - especially when she's doing something like putting it on the floor after grabbing an offensive board in low traffic. But then you look down at the box score and she's got 12 and 9.

[slufanskip]

1 hour ago, Pistol said:

This drives me crazy. This is something traditional bigs should have eliminated from their game by mid-HS.

Wilken is an interesting player. Slow as molasses, plodding, and methodical. She has a knack for being in the right place at the right time, but it's exhausting watching her operate in slow motion - especially when she's doing something like putting it on the floor after grabbing an offensive board in low traffic. But then you look down at the box score and she's got 12 and 9.

I'm not disagreeing that it's something she does if you an 05 say it is. However, it isn't something I noticed as standing out and that surprises me as it's normally something I would catch. 

However, the idea that the ball is getting knocked away and/or blocked at an excessive rate … the stats just don't seem to support that. If she's getting blocked frequently she must finish a tremendous amount of her shots that aren't blocked, plus she must be very secure with the ball as she averages 2 t/o's a game and she touches the ball a lot. 

I'm guessing it happens and it seems frustrating so it appears to be more often than it actually is. 

I have a feeling if she just caught and went up strong immediately all the time she'd get blocked more often as she is methodical and slow and can't jump. I'm going to pay attention but I'd guess she's trying to get her timing right.  Sometimes you see Goodwin do the same thing inside, and not because he's methodical and slow but because he's amid bigger players so he waits a second, finds his opening and goes up. What Goodwin also has is a nice subtle pump fake which also seems to get him to the line a lot in those situations. 

[doowop]

23 hours ago, billikenfan05 said:

That looked like a good Colgate team. This women’s team feels a lot like the Majerus teams in that they don’t light the world on fire offensively but man do they shut down on defense..

side note:

Kendra Wilken bringing offensive boards below her waist, power dribbling, taking it back up and getting blocked is enough to make me walk away from the TV.

Just watched the replay of the Colgate game and it is plain to see what you say about Wilken is true.  Maybe the coaching staff will help her change.

[Gremio14]

On 11/24/2019 at 8:52 PM, RUBillsFan said:

First, I’m an MBM when it comes to women’s basketball.  Second, I understand that perhaps we needed the starters to play big minutes for the win today, but it (again) seems like Stone is leaning too heavily on just a few players.  Kent (a freshman) played all 40 minutes today.  Harbison played 39 and Smith-Traore played 37.  I’ve felt in the past Stone has done this and it’s come back to bite the team late in the year.  This team feels like it has more depth than she’s ever had, but we’re seeing the same thing in terms of a very short rotation and a few players being used very heavily.

The “playing time” situation will become even more interesting in January, when Jadiah Stewart enters the mix.  Effusively labeled as “the best player ever to suit up for the Lady Bills, better than even Jackie” by someone in authority very, very, close to the team.  I’m looking forward to it!

[slufanskip]

58 minutes ago, Gremio14 said:

The “playing time” situation will become even more interesting in January, when Jadiah Stewart enters the mix.  Effusively labeled as “the best player ever to suit up for the Lady Bills, better than even Jackie” by someone in authority very, very, close to the team.  I’m looking forward to it!

Wasn't she a top 100 recruit? With Ciaja that would give the Lady Bills 2 top 100 guards. 

Do you know anything about her game? Shooter? Slasher? The Bills need another consistent outside threat to go along with Rachel Kent. 

I'd guess she mostly affect the minutes of Julia, Hannah, and Myia

[slufanskip]

The 2 things the ladies really need to improve on is shooting the 3. Besides Kent they are just under 25% as a team. They also need to cut turnovers down as they are averaging 18 per game

[willie]

33 minutes ago, slufanskip said:

The 2 things the ladies really need to improve on is shooting the 3. Besides Kent they are just under 25% as a team. They also need to cut turnovers down as they are averaging 18 per game

It is interesting to me how much the team has changed over the last couple of years. They  use to be dependent on three point shooting from Franz and Jenny Vilet . Now they are much more athletic but lack outside shooting. 

[slufanskip]

17 minutes ago, willie said:

It is interesting to me how much the team has changed over the last couple of years. They  use to be dependent on three point shooting from Franz and Jenny Vilet . Now they are much more athletic but lack outside shooting. 

and Jackie Kemph could hit the 3 enough to at least keep you honest defensively. We're certainly bigger and more athletic than previous years but like you said we don't shoot the 3 as well as we did in previous years. The turnovers though really surprise me. Ciaja is averaging 4.6 t/o's per game with just 3 assists per game. 

[RUBillsFan]

41 minutes ago, slufanskip said:

The 2 things the ladies really need to improve on is shooting the 3. Besides Kent they are just under 25% as a team. They also need to cut turnovers down as they are averaging 18 per game

Dossett was supposed to be an outside shooter based on the reports when they announced her grad transfer and pre-season: https://www.stltoday.com/sports/college/slu/stone-hopes-toughness-makes-slu-women-hard-to-beat/article_4004e7c0-8a32-5de4-a5a5-d1dca5a03dcc.html

Quote

Perimeter-shooting specialist Hannah Dossett is an intriguing transfer from Syracuse, where she played four seasons of softball before deciding to return to basketball for her graduate season.

She's only played 31 total minutes over 4 of the 6 total team games and taken only 5 threes making just 1.  Too small of a sample size to really judge her at all.  Also sort of understandable that she's not getting a bunch of minutes since she hasn't played competitively in over 4 years.

I don't want to be too critical because the WBB team has been good so far largely because of phenomenal defense.  However, offensively Harbison and Flowers have been the biggest disappointments so far.  They've both regressed from their freshman year numbers.  Harbison in particular is majorly contributing the the 3pt shooting and turnover woes.

 

[kmbilliken]

6 hours ago, Gremio14 said:

The “playing time” situation will become even more interesting in January, when Jadiah Stewart enters the mix.  Effusively labeled as “the best player ever to suit up for the Lady Bills, better than even Jackie” by someone in authority very, very, close to the team.  I’m looking forward to it!

I hope that is true, but I won’t believe it until I see it. This team(or almost any team) goes up a level by adding a Kemp or Lisch to the roster.

[thetorch]

Lady Bills are in the middle of 12 days off.  They are coming off a big win over Ill St.  Clark had a career high 22 points, Harbison scored 20.  

The Billikens are now 34th in RPI with a chance to move up.  Their next games are against 9-1 Princeton who has the #9 RPI and 8-0 Kansas who has the 35th highest RPI.  Then we finish off the Noncon schedule at Indiana St.  The two tough games are at home.  

Coach Stone definitely came in with a tougher schedule this year and at 7-3 we are doing well.  We are set up nicely for a WNIT berth with an outside chance for an NCAA berth with a top3 finish in the A10. 

[Cowboy]

3 hours ago, thetorch said:

Lady Bills are in the middle of 12 days off.  They are coming off a big win over Ill St.  Clark had a career high 22 points, Harbison scored 20.  

The Billikens are now 34th in RPI with a chance to move up.  Their next games are against 9-1 Princeton who has the #9 RPI and 8-0 Kansas who has the 35th highest RPI.  Then we finish off the Noncon schedule at Indiana St.  The two tough games are at home.  

Coach Stone definitely came in with a tougher schedule this year and at 7-3 we are doing well.  We are set up nicely for a WNIT berth with an outside chance for an NCAA berth with a top3 finish in the A10. 

-good work, Ladies, keep it going

[slufanskip]

Anyone know what game Jaidah Stewart becomes eligible? 

[willie]

1 hour ago, slufanskip said:

Anyone know what game Jaidah Stewart becomes eligible? 

I believe as soon as the first semester ends. Not sure what game that is. 

[kmbilliken]

They had graduation last Friday so first semester must be over.

[willie]

13 minutes ago, kmbilliken said:

They had graduation last Friday so first semester must be over.

Not necessarily. I believe it’s after the last exam. That said I would hope she could play by this weekend. 

[SluSignGuy]

5 minutes ago, willie said:

Not necessarily. I believe it’s after the last exam. That said I would hope she could play by this weekend. 

Last exam tomorrow.  Grades due Thursday. 

[slufanskip]

Thanks for the answers though I'm not sure if anyone actually knows. I was hoping she could play this weekend also