Las Vegas Sun

March 28, 2024

Lady Rebels expect WNIT shootout

It might be appropriate that the cheerleader who normally runs onto the court with the gigantic UNLV flag replace it with a Mountain West Conference banner when the Lady Rebels go against Western Kentucky in the Women's National Invitation Tournament quarterfinal at 7:30 tonight at Cox Pavilion.

Last week at this time, six MWC teams were still bouncing the basketball during March Madness while a seventh, the Utah women, opted to sulk on the sideline after turning down a WNIT bid.

It's unknown whether the Utes are still sulking. What is known is that only one MWC team is still dancing.

"We used that as motivation before the Rice game," Lady Rebels coach Regina Miller said. "You have to be as creative as possible at this time of the year.

"Now, we want to get this done for ourselves. We want to keep the season going as long as possible."

If the Lady Rebels (24-7) are going to continue their somewhat unexpected postseason run, they'll have to beat a team that is virtually a mirror image of UNLV.

Like UNLV, Western Kentucky (20-13) is a young team that features only one senior in its starting lineup, with three players scoring the majority of the points. And like the Lady Rebels, the Lady Toppers' success is predicated on pressure defense and a push-it-up-the-floor mind set.

In fact, if you go by their scores, WKU just doesn't push the ball up the floor. It flings it.

The Lady Toppers average 72 points per game, have topped 80 four times and gone over 100 once. That just happened to be the last time out, as WKU outlasted Memphis 104-87 on Sunday in a frenetic game that began with a shot from a starter's pistol instead of a center jump.

Miller never thought she would be talking about the Lady Rebels playing a little more deliberately, but that might be the case against Western Kentucky.

"We don't want it to be a rat race," she said. "We still want to get out and run when the opportunity presents itself, but we want to run well. They way you do that is to make good decisions in the open court."

Most of the Lady Toppers' decisions, conversely, result in field-goal attempts.

"We definitely do," chuckled WKU's second-year coach Mary Taylor Cowles, when asked if her players liked to run and shoot.

"We'll see what happens. We are shooting the ball extremely well. And we know UNLV is extremely aggressive with the two post players (RanDee Henry and Sherry McCracklin) and with (Sheena) Moore, it also looks like they've got some big-time scoring ability from the outside."

Moore, UNLV's penetrating sophomore guard, is coming off a career-high 33 points in the Lady Rebels' 68-66 second-round victory against Rice Sunday. She, Henry and McCracklin combined to score UNLV's first 51 points against the Lady Owls.

Western Kentucky has a "Big Three" of its own. Sophomore guard Tiffany Porter-Talbert leads the Lady Toppers with a 16.7 scoring average, followed by senior guard Leslie Logsdon at 14.3 and freshman forward Carla Bartee at 11.1.

In the win against Memphis, Bartee finished with a career-high 32 points, Logsdon had 27 and Porter-Talbert 22.

The Lady Rebels might also want to keep an eye on Logsdon when she drifts outside. She needs just one more 3-pointer to equal WKU's career record.

"Those three have been the backbone of our team," Cowles said. "But the reason we've got 20 wins is we've got players up and down our basketball team who know how to rebound and shoot the ball well."

The Lady Rebels know all about the value of solid role players at this time of the year. Against Rice it was senior point guard InFini Robinson who stepped up, hitting the go-ahead basket, pulling down a key rebound and sinking two free throws in the final 38 seconds that proved decisive.

While UNLV is not lacking for confidence these days, the Lady Rebels will take to the court knowing they did a little better against Utah than WKU did.

The Lady Rebels won once in three tries against the Utes while the Lady Toppers were defeated, 84-55. But it also should be noted that that game was played way back on Nov. 28.

For these teams, that must seem like a long time ago.

archive