Sixth-ranked Terps women prepare for Ohio State’s Kelsey Mitchell
|
Version 0 of 1. On Monday night, the sixth-ranked Maryland women’s basketball team had to contend with Breanna Stewart, the reigning two-time national player of the year who has led Connecticut to three straight national championships. Less than a week later, the Terrapins are bracing for perhaps the most skilled scorer in the country in Ohio State’s Kelsey Mitchell. The 5-foot-8 sophomore guard is averaging 24.4 points, which is tied for second in the country. The No. 9 Buckeyes, meanwhile, enter on a five-game winning streak and are seeking to end Maryland’s stranglehold on the Big Ten. The Terrapins have won 31 in a row against Big Ten opponents, including going undefeated in the regular season and conference tournament in 2014-15. “Obviously one of the best players in the country,” Maryland Coach Brenda Frese said. “You’re not going to stop her. You obviously want to slow her down. You want to make her shots more difficult. We’re going to have to defend by committee. She’s just so talented and makes everyone else around her better. Just a prolific scorer who can score in so many ways.” [Terps hold their own, but fall to top-ranked U-Conn.] Maryland (12-1, 1-0 Big Ten) has won four in a row against the Buckeyes (9-3) dating from 2007, most recently a 77-74 win in the Big Ten tournament championship game March 8. In the teams’ only regular season meeting last year in College Park, the Terrapins limited Mitchell to 19 points on 7-for-26 shooting with four turnovers. They also held second leading scorer Ameryst Alston, who’s averaging 19.5 points, to 9-for-23 shooting. Laurin Mincy played a significant role in that 87-78 win, but the tenacious defender graduated. Maryland instead figures to rely on its depth to defend Mitchell with a back-court rotation that includes first-team all-Big Ten guard Shatori Walker-Kimbrough, who leads the Terrapins in scoring (18.3), steals (2.2) and blocks (1.5). “She’s a great player. She’s great scorer,” Walker-Kimbrough said of Mitchell. “She’s going to get her shots. She’s going to get her points, but I know we want to make sure every shot she takes is difficult, making sure we have a hand in her face and making her uncomfortable, and if possible denying her catches because she can’t score without the ball in her hand.” In Thursday’s 79-63 road victory over Illinois in the Big Ten opener, Walker-Kimbrough had 13 points, six rebounds and three assists. The junior was among eight players who logged at least 10 minutes and one of four who reached double-figure scoring. Junior center Brionna Jones added 16 points on 7-for-10 shooting and a career-high 19 rebounds. Jones is playing some of the finest basketball of her career in this stretch following the Christmas break. In Monday’s 83-73 loss to the Huskies, the all-Big Ten selection had a game-high 24 points, making 12 of 14 field goal attempts, in addition to seven rebounds. This season Jones is shooting 71 percent, best in the nation. The Terrapins’ third game in six days on Saturday afternoon concludes the busiest portion of their schedule since three games in as many days during a Thanksgiving tournament in the Virgin Islands. Frese has been keeping practices short this week in an effort to avoid fatigue, which players said contributed to a sluggish beginning against the Fighting Illini. “We weren’t too happy with how we came out,” said senior guard Chloe Pavlech, who has been playing against Mitchell since both were in high school in Ohio. “We thought with the way we showed we could really play against Connecticut that we didn’t set the bar as high as we could of, and we didn’t play to our standards. People were tired. Everyone’s tired, but game in, game out, people want to beat us so we have to make sure we bring it every game.” |