“As much as I wanna give the other team credit, I just think for us, we didn’t play our best basketball today.”
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Not the Best Day for the Commodores in Athens
A couple of things about sports and life for that matter, every day won’t be your best day and Sunday in Athens, Ga., it was not the Vanderbilt Commodores Women’s Basketball team’s best day. After a couple of monster wins last week at home, the Commodores looked like the team that they will need to be when the post season arrives.
Saturday night, the initial seeding projections were released for the NCAA Tournament, and Vanderbilt was slotted as a possible fourth overall seed. It looked as if everyone in those rooms had really taken notice, as they should, but as you know there are still games to play and some teams have not reached their final potential yet. That could actually be a good thing when you think about it. There is still time to peak.
However, time is drawing closer and closer, and as Coach Ralph often mentions, this team still has improvements to make. They have not played their best basketball. Some of us pass that off as coach speak, but today during a 76-74 loss to an unranked Georgia Bulldogs team, those words were far from coach speak, and now it is time to respond again.
Vanderbilt showed today in-game that they could respond, and that was a great thing that was taken from this game. After falling behind by 14 early, they fought their way back over time to actually take a lead but couldn’t keep the Bulldogs off after a back and forth second half.
“I am really proud that we fought out of the hole early on. You know, this team hasn’t been here before. I think when I look at the way that they fought today, and the opportunities that we had that we weren’t able to take advantage of. When I look at the week that we just had, and I think about the preparation, I could have done a better job preparing them today,” said Ralph.
One of the things that stuck out even louder today were the missed shots, more so the ones right at the rim. The Dores left enough points on the floor that would have won them the game. A game that ultimately came down to a last second opportunity.
Coaches always take responsibility for preparation and improvement, and rightfully so, but some things are beyond the control of a coach or a game plan. Missing easy looks at the rim is one of those areas I struggle to see as a coaching fix. Still, I asked Ralph afterwards how she plans to address it.
“I mean, I don’t know that you can address it. I think you just continue to give your kids confidence and put them in positions to work on it every day, which we do,” she said.
Working every day on things is what a team that is striving for better does, but that work has to transfer to the in-game situation. Those types of things can and will stack up and ultimately be a huge reason a game even comes down to a last second play such as today. It always comes back to what we could have done to not be in this situation.
“I always think the ball’s gonna go in, but today we did miss a bunch of bunnies. We missed a bunch of wide open threes and we missed one at the end of the game. But when I think about it, I tell the players all the time, the game never comes down to the last play,” Ralph said.
The deal with Vanderbilt is they still have everything in front of them. They didn’t lose at Georgia because they are overrated or any of that nonsense that fans like to spew. They lost because they just didn’t have their best day, and credit to the Bulldogs who came with an aggressive plan.
There was plenty today that they can take to film and practice this week. That is a big positive out of this, and also the SEC has ballers on every team.
They sort of gave Dani Carnegie some red carpet treatment, and she took advantage. You can’t let the team’s top scorer get comfortable, and some of the defensive breakdowns weren’t ideal. That allowed Carnegie and others time and space to knock down shots. Also, Mia Woolfolk was clutch with 80 percent from the field, and played a big role down the stretch getting good looks in the paint.
“I think we gave her (Carnegie) too many open looks. Number one, I don’t think you can ever let a good scorer get comfortable looks, and she did. Some of the things that we did defensively don’t look like what we work on in terms of some of the switches at the point of the screens,” said Ralph.
“We were way lower than we needed to be, which gave her space and time. I thought we got confused a little bit on some of the other things, back actions going on, whether we were in our man or zone, and gave them the opportunity to either get downhill or kick out for wide open threes.”
Those things the Commodores will go back to work on, and with a much needed off week ahead, they can get some well needed recovery and get to work on sharpening up.
My takeaway from today on Mikayla Blakes, is even when it’s not her best day, she can still get points on the board. With only eight shots taken from the field, I will still give credit to Georgia. They put together a good plan to try and eliminate her as best they could. In the first quarter, Blakes had zero points on zero shots. When is the last time that has happened?
Then in the second quarter, she began to go to work and scored 12 before halftime. Blakes would finish with 27 points, six assists, three steals, and one rebound. When Blakes drove, she drew her fouls and went 19-for-20 from the free throw line. There is no criticism needed for that. She still did what she needed to get points on the board and make Georgia work even harder to guard her.
Justine Pissott played her butt off and dropped 23 points with five rebounds, shooting 9-for-15 from the field, with 5-for-8 from beyond the arc. Pissott will be a major key going into the post season. You gotta have that player that can catch and pop, and she is the one that can do that. Also, her post up turnaround jumper game is pretty nice also.
Pissott is bringing it from all levels on the floor and on both ends. With this being her last year, I expect to see even more of a boost from her coming down the stretch.
So, some good things still came from today but there is much to work on, and the Commodores have a week off before Kentucky comes to Memorial Gymnasium. It’s time to lock in, and that is Shea Ralph’s plan.
“I tell my team, let’s eliminate the noise because we hear all the positive things, but we can beat every team and we can also lose to every team. It’s just the reality of playing in the SEC, but it tests you and you will grow either way.
So that’s why I talk all the time, whether we’re in here talking about a win or we’ve just taken a loss. We just have to stick to the process of continuously improving. And so today, it sucked. I don’t like to lose, but there’s a lot that we can take away that will make us a better team.
And this isn’t a loss that ends our season. We have a lot of time now to continue to work on becoming better, and that’s exactly what we’re gonna do.”
