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Message: [QUOTE="ConwayGmck, post: 4110303, member: 10442"] My Game Report Card: At this point in time, South Carolina has the more balanced team attack, both offensively and defensively. We can break this down between front-court and back-court: [B]Front-Court:[/B] The "bigs" - post players - for Connecticut of Nelson-Ododa, Edwards, and Juhasz combined for 14 pts on 7-14 shooting, with 11 rebounds, 6 blocks, 5 assists, 3 steals, 8 fouls, and 9 turnovers. Three players. The "bigs" for South Carolina - Boston, Cardoso, Amihere, Saxton, combined for 29 pts on 13-25 shooting, with 26 rebounds, 2 blocks, 4 assists, 2 steals, 7 fouls, 6 turnovers. Four players. Juhasz, Amihere, and Saxton were effectively non-productive. ONO and Edwards combined for 6-10 conversion, but only 10 shot attempts? Seems they could've been more aggressive/assertive offensively with their effective conversions of the attempts they had. CT - especially ONO - wins a big defensive post presence with her shot-blocking, but that's about it. For USC, Boston was their lion's share of production, although Cardoso provided strong rebounding at a time when CT started missing shots and could've used some rebounds for additional attempts. In any case, the Gamecocks clearly [B]won the Front Court Battle[/B]. [B]Back-Court:[/B] We all know about Paige Bueckers, and for a time there, it sure looked like she was going to hoist her team back on her shoulders, and steal the game again. I think she got a bit tired in the late stages. Combined the guard tandem of Bueckers, Westbrook, and Williams WERE the Huskie offense, combining for [B]43 points[/B] on 15-36 shooting, and 3-7 from the 3-pt. line, with 13 assists, 7 rebounds, 9 turnovers, and 2 steals. No other Huskie guard scored. Fudd took a shot attempt. The Gamecock guards of Henderson and Cooke were big producers for the Gamecocks. Littleton provided two big 3-pt. shots, and Beal also provided 6 pts. Combined, they totaled [B]44 points[/B] combined on 18-42 shooting, with 8 assists, 11 rebounds, 7 turnovers, and 9 steals. That's 4 Gamecock guards compared to 3 Huskie guards, but being able to stay close with CT in scoring from the back-court - even to surpass CT in scoring - was a HUGE win for South Carolina, in addition to what they were able to do in the front-court battle. Because of this, the Gamecocks also - albeit only marginally - [B]win the Back Court Battle[/B]. So Round One goes to South Carolina. For this game alone, South Carolina appeared to have the more balanced team, both offensively and defensively. I feel CT could have gotten more offensive production from their bigs: the shooting from ONO and Edwards shouldn't have caused Auriemma concerns for any inefficiency, as they shot well enough given the attempts they did take. But the HUGE decider here was that the Gamecocks were able to match the Huskie guard play pretty much point-for-point, so that made the clear offensive edge to them in front-court production the game-winner. That's no guarantee how Round Two goes in late January, in Columbia, SC. Now both coaching staffs have ideas on what they need to work on to improve their teams, and most of the season ahead of them before the next game. I imagine that the next one could be entirely different...... [/QUOTE]

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