Crazy eights: Shorthanded Oakland crushes Western Illinois
ON THE MOVE: Oakland's Malika Glover and the Golden Grizzlies ran past Western Illinois 64-38 in Summit League play Saturday at the O'Rena.
BY DAN STICKRADT
SENIOR EDITOR
dan.stickradt@northoaklandsports.com
ROCHESTER HILLS — Oakland University has proven that you don’t need a deep bench to win a basketball game.
Saddled with injuries, the Golden Grizzlies overcame that adversity Saturday at the Athletics Center O’Rena in defeating Western Illinois in convincing fashion.
Oakland never trailed in blowing past the Leathernecks, 64-38, in a Summit League women’s basketball game. The Golden Grizzlies entered the game with only eight healthy players, and one of those is a walk-on, Anne Hafeli, who got some minutes late in the both halves.
With Elizabeth Hamlet out with a potential stress fracture and three other Golden Grizzlies (10-6, 4-1) on the sidelines with likely redshirt injuries, plus the recent transfer of Brittany Nelson to Division II Valdosta State, OU was left with a very short bench.
To make matters seemingly worse, Anna Patritto was limited to seven minutes due to back problems — she spent her time on the bench wearing an ice-brace — as five players was forced to play between 28 and 33 minutes.
That didn’t matter.
Two players scored in double figures and four scored at least eight, as Oakland simply ran the Leathernecks off the court.
“I was really pleased with how our team followed the game plan,” said Oakland head coach Beckie Francis. “We wanted to get the ball inside to Bethany (Watterworth) and (Brittany) Carnago and I thought our players had some great passes. We also worked really hard on defense all week and it showed.”
Watterworth, the second leading scorer in the Summit League at 19.5 points an outing, finished the night with 22 points, seven rebounds, and five assists to lead a balanced effort.
Carnago used her 6-foot-3 frame inside to collect 12 points, eight rebounds, five assists and three blocks, junior guard Sharise Calhoun had eight points, seven rebounds and four assists had and Malika Glover chipped in with nine points in her first career start.
“This is a great team win for us,” admitted Watterworth. “We were fired up. We haven’t played a game in over a week. We were itching to get out. We worked hard preparing for them. Now we are going to get focused for IUPUI on Monday.”
Oakland led 32-16 at the half and opened the second half with 16-6 run to go up 49-22 with 11:50 left in the game. Oakland was shooting at 50 percent clip (18-for-36) at that point, despite being shorthanded, and finished the night at 46.9 percent (23-for-49).
The lead grew to as many as 28 points in the second half.
Oakland used its inside-outside approach, trying to get the ball down low to Carnago and then look for the open play.
“That was our game plan to get three ball down to (Carnago). We had a height advantage on them,” said Watterworth. “It was good to see her have a good game and Sharise Calhoun had some awesome passes. It was really good to see her get going.”
The Golden Grizzlies opened the game with a 6-0 spurt and continued to pull away. Three different Grizzlies made three-pointers in opening up a 21-8 lead nine minutes into the contest. Western Illinois could never recover.
Oakland forced 15 turnovers and allowed WIU to grab just six offensive rebounds. The Leathernecks finished a dismal 15-for-52 shooting (28.8 percent) in the contest and were off the mark from 3-point range, making just 3-of-17 shots from beyond the arc.
Oakland out-rebounded Western Illinois (4-10, 2-2) by a 40-26 margin.
“There was a bit of sports psychology involved today. But this team is so resilient,” said Francis. “We lost a player, we gain a player back, we lose another player and we gain another back—it’s the most we’ve ever had. But we have great leadership on this team and they’re handling (the situations of the season) really well.”
Brittany Demery scored eight and Sadie Webb and Valencia Kelly both finished with seven points for Western Illinois.
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Category: Oakland University
