It was a game the Hokies were generally expected to win. A surprisingly feisty Gardner-Webb team put up a tough fight in the early goings, but the Hokies just piled up the points, rebounds, and defense to pull away as the game wore on.
Overall Game View
Gardner-Webb normally doesn’t present a big issue on the start charts. Their trip to Blacksburg was very unlikely to result in a win, but… (Isn’t there always a “but” somewhere?) This Hokie team has produced 100% ‘slow starts’ for the opening of the season. Maybe it is a rhythm and pace thing, or just getting the game start physical tools are flowing in the same direction, but the Lady Hokies seem to have a bit of an issue getting the ball to fall, early on, in games. With the level of the last three opponents, this isn’t really an issue, but face an NC State, Duke, or UVA with the lid on the bucket for the first five minutes, and the resulting runs might present some problems.
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The Hokies posted what looks to be the standard start for, at least, the beginning of the season. Kilah Freelon handled the tip off, Mackie Nelson, Carleigh Wenzel, Mel Daley, and Carys Baker.
The starting lineup for this one really didn’t seem to matter as the game wore on, though. No one played more than 25 minutes, and the player longest on the floor was a healthy, scrappy, and charged up Samyha Suffren who was hitting from everywhere, and playing super defense.
But that slow start before the media break was frustrating.
The First Quarter was a Standard Transmission
It was nearly a minute before starting post Kilah Freelon hit one of her 2 free throws to get the scoring started. Freelon was back from whatever kept her out of the last game, and #0 lined up at center court for the tip-0ff which the Hokies won. Mel Daley (who also had an excellent game) dropped in a nice 12-foot jumper. Then G-W started responding as the ice broke. Tech had some ball handling issues in the heavy press put on by the Bulldogs, and after a few buckets, the Hokies found themselves behind 7-8 and there was 6:02 on the clock.
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Coach Duffy had started her substitution relay and gave Carleigh a bit of a rest. Samyha Suffren started her team high scoring effort by dropping in a layup on a strong fast move to the basket. After some misses and close inside rebounding Carys Baker put in a short jumper from just outside the lane, and then the Hokies hit one of their dry spells. It would be nearly 2 minutes before Kayl Petersen, doing some tough inside work, put back her own rebound from Baker’s 3-point attempt to break the lid on the bucket.
Thankfully the Hokie defensive work held the line, and G-W didn’t score anything either. They were stuck at 8 points, and still trying to find the bucket, too. Samyha would score two more buckets, and Carleigh would finish the scoring for the quarter with an old fashioned 3-point play. But that was with 1:52 left on the clock, and no one would score after that.
The horn went off, and the Hokies led the Bulldogs 20-8, but there were still some frustrations as they were just seeming to have some difficulty getting the ball to fall.
The 2nd was a Steady Pile Up of Points
If you look at the 2nd quarter, Tech added another five points to the differential before the half, but you also saw Gardner-Webb having nothing to do with giving up, either. Tech did put up another 20 points for the period, but G-W put in 15 of their own. The Hokies were building something, but it wasn’t explosive, it was just steady. There was a bit of a notice in the period on both sides of the scoring issue. The first was, again, the Hokies had the lid drop on the bucket and had some annoying problems getting the ball to fall from outside and inside. The second was the pace at which Coach Duffy substituted players to alter whatever balance seemed to help the Hokie break the scoring ice.
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Tech saw more of Kilah Freelon who opened the door on the period with two buckets from inside. Carleigh checked in tough with two free-throws and two baskets from downtown. Samyha added 5 points to her game total with two free-throws and a nice strike from beyond the arc. Amani Jenkins put in a point from the stripe, and Carys Baker closed out the scoring with a quick jumper as the clock drained away.
The players all cleared the floor as halftime began at 40-23. The Hokies were firmly in control of the game, but they still had to address the dry spells that held them back from a much more dominating performance. They were more than halfway to biscuits, but they had some things to talk about.
The Third Period Set the Stage for Biscuits
The third period looked sort of jumbled and disorganized. Well, not in a bad way. Coach Duffy began the process of clearing the bench and getting as much of the team some minutes on the floor as possible. In football it’s called garbage time, I’m not sure what it’s called in basketball.
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By the end of the game, every player on the roster had, at least a few minutes on the floor and some opportunities to make a contribution.
The game was over by the middle of the 4th. Gardner-Webb kept up as much pressure as they could but a well-conditioned and subbing frequently Lady Hokie team was just consistently keeping the advantage on the exchanges. Late in the game teams with big leads sometimes either run away and hide or get lazy and have to scramble to keep up. The Hokies managed to keep the energy up and get the maximum value out of their bench players.
The final score wasn’t completely indicative of the effort. The bench came in and held their own without losing their defensive pressure or their offense. By the end of the game every player had gotten some time on the floor including this particularly special event for Freshman Spela Brecelj. Our new #11 was Hokie Sports’ call of the game from Evan Hughes and Liz Kitley.
It was an example of solid loose ball recovery, finding the open player, and a cool square up swish from Spela. Those were her first collegiate points, it was a trey, and the crowd and bench knew exactly what had happened. You have to hope that someone pulled that basketball for her. It was a special moment.
Individual Statistics
If we put this list in order of points then Samyha would be on the top of the list, but we always start with the special hits… double-doubles and such. This time, the first name on the individual stats list absolutely has to be:
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Kilah Freelon
Kilah ended the contest with a shade over 24 minutes on the court, and with that time she put up a nice 12-point performance, but that wasn’t her big feat of the evening. Freelon was queen of the backboards for the evening with 18 rebounds. Nine of those rebounds were critical offensive boards that allowed for multiple putbacks. She also had an assist and a steal. It was an excellent performance from winning the tip off to the final horn.
Samyha Suffren
Samyha came off the bench in the first quarter and immediately sparked a major scoring push. It wasn’t a huge run, but Suffren’s contribution was speed, defense, and quality shooting. Suffren scored 17 points on 13 attempts. She hit 2 from beyond the arc and piled up 4 steals and a block on defense. She added 4 rebounds (1 ORB, 3 DRB) to that effort. At nearly 25 minutes, like Kilah, Samyha played significant minutes and used every one of them.
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Mel Daley
Where’d she come from? That seemed to cross the mind as Mel Daley, with her Catwoman mask and quick moves played a transition game that scored points and move the ball in and out of traffic. Daley wrapped the game with 14 points. What you don’t see from that number was that she was 6-7 from the floor including a 3-pointer. She was also perfect from the free-throw line, grabbed 2 offensive boards, with an assist and a steal on defense. Between Daley, Suffren, Carleigh, and Mackie, there are fast breaks written all over this team’s skill portfolio. Daley pulled of a nice solo break to light up the crowd in this one.
Carleigh Wenzel
It’s not a mid 20’s game without Carleigh checking in. Wenzel was relatively quiet for most of the game. Coach Duffy subbed her in and out without much external rhyme or reason. Whatever it was the strategy worked. Wenzel put up 12 points, 2 rebounds, a steal, and an assist for the game.
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Carys Baker
It was a relatively quiet outing for Carys, too. With Freelon and Suffren adding speed and inside presence to things, Baker was her usual steady self. She scored 10 points, 4 from the charity stripe, and pulled down 4 boards.
Kayl Petersen, Mackie Nelson, Leila Wells, Sophie Swanson, Aniya Trent, Amani Jenkins, and Spela Brecelj
Kayl scored 7, pulled in 5 rebounds (3 on offense). Mackie just does her things. She took a grand total of 4 shots and made one (3-pointer). but she led the team in assists (7) and grabbed 4 rebounds. Leila came in for 16 and a half minutes. She had a lid on the basket for most of her attempts but made a nice trey. Wells managed 5 rebounds, four of which were offensive and grabbed a steal on defense. Sophie (4) and Amani (2) each scored and contributed notably Jenkins had 5 rebounds three of which were on offense. We already mentioned Spela, but her 3 points were the first of her collegiate career and hopefully we see her develop and score more in the future.
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Next Up
Coastal Carolina shows up at the Cassell for a 2pm tip. The football game doesn’t start until 7:30 so we’ll be there to cover. This is a step up to the next level of competition game, and it will be interesting to see how the Hokies react on short rest.
