At this late stage in the season, any team still standing in their respective post-season tournament should be riding a thin-line of confidence in their ability with an understanding that the work is not yet done.
The Zags, while understandably disappointed to miss out on the NCAA Tournament, appear motivated and are recapturing a bit of that mojo we saw back in January. Sunday’s victory over the Buffaloes wasn’t perfect with some of the worst tendencies of this team rearing their ugly head at various points, but the gang tended to go through smaller stretches of poor play compared to recent matches.
The 9-point victory over Colorado means that the Zags will next face-off against McKynnlie Dalan’s former program, the Minnesota Golden Gophers. The Minneapolis based program gets to host this matchup as they have the #2 seed in this quadrant of the WBIT after a season that saw them finish with a final record of 22-11 (8-10) and 13th in the 18-team Big 10.
The Gophers were actually ranked for two weeks in January reaching as high as #23. At that time, the team was 18-3 highlighted a by a non-conference victory over Oregon State 73-38 along with two big conference wins against Illinois and Nebraska. However, they finished the regular season 2-8 and lost in the first round of the Big 10 Tournament to the University of Washington.
So far in the WBIT, we’ve seen the Golden Gophers defeat Toledo 65-63 and Missouri State 78-71. While the Zags didn’t play Toledo this year, that was last season, they did play against Missouri State in the opening match of the Paradise Jam when they lost 64-65.
On the season, Minnesota offense averaged 73.4 points per game. Their two/three-pointer split is just about 66/33 and they shoot much better from two, 49.3% which ranks 76th nationally, than three, 31.9% which ranks 148th. A lot of their baskets come from assists as the team dished out a total of 513 dimes, which averaged 15.5 per game and sits as the 56th best in the country. Expect the Gophers to battle for boards on both ends as they grabbed a total of 38.2 per game, 88th nationally, with the splits being 12.5 offensive and 25.7 defensive.
On the flip side, the Gophers’ defense allowed allowed 61.2 points per game. They tend to force a good amount of turnovers, 15.3, but interestingly they don’t generate much in the way of steals, 7.6 which ranks 188th, and certainly not in blocks, 2.0, which ranks 321st. However they’re doing it though, it’s working as those 61.2 allowed points registered as third best in the Big 10 behind the behemoths of USC and UCLA. I suspect some of this relates to their snail-like pace of 68.5, relatively speaking at least given GU’s 67.6 pace rating, that ranked second to last in the Big 10.
Two players from our upcoming opposition earned Big 10 honors with both Amaya Battle and Grace Grocholski earning honorable mentions for the All-Big 10 Team.
The leading scorer and leading three point shooter by volume, 5’10” sophomore wing Grace finished her season with 12.9 points, 4.9 rebounds, 2.8 assists, 1.3 steals, 0.3 blocks, and 1.8 turnovers. Averaging 5.5 threes per game, the Bulldogs will need to keep an eye on the Wisconsinite’s perimeter position as she knocks down 35% of those attempts. However, they’ll also need to contest her inside the arc given her 51.5% shooting on 10.5 shots per game from that range.
Checking in at 5’11” and holding down the point guard spot with Mara Brown out injured for the season since November, Amaya sits second on this team in scoring and first in assists. As it stands currently, the Minnesota native averages 12.1 points, 5 rebounds, 4.1 assists, 1.7 steals, 0.3 blocks, and 2.5 turnovers per game. She’s not a particularly threatening shooter, 44.3% from two and 27.8% from three, but she will likely possess the ball early and often if her second-highest on the team usage rate says anything.
Below these two players sit 5 others averaging between 8.1 to 9.8 points per game, but after them the scoring and minutes drop precipitously with only one other player averaging more than 10 minutes per game and she averages 1.9 points. Those five aforementioned players are as follows
Tori McKinney (Fr. G – 6’1”) — 9.8 points, 3.0 rebounds, 2.4 assists, 1.2 steals
Sophie Hart (Sr. C – 6’5”) — 9.2 points, 4.4 rebounds, 1.3 assists
Annika Stewart (Sr. F – 6’3”) — 9.2 points, 2.2 rebounds, 0.7 assists
Mallory Heyer (Jr. F – 6’1”) — 8.3 points, 7.7 rebounds, 0.8 assists
Taylor Woodson (So. F – 6’0”) — 8.1 points, 4.4 rebounds, 0.8 assists
Sophie Hart is an interesting one because while she has started every match for her squad, she only plays a little over 21 minutes per match and she averages 2.6 offensive rebounds in that time. This translates to an offensive rebounding percentage of 13.6%, which is notably better than Yvonne Ejim’s 11.9%.
There’s a lot of size on this Minnesota squad with no regular playing coming in less than 5’11”. That’s going to be interesting to watch given how the Zags have struggled against more physically imposing teams in the past. One area of concern particularly relating to this will Gonzaga’s propensity for defensive fouls given their recent 5-game stretch of 16+ fouls per game. If our bigs get into trouble here, it could be a long night.
When looking at the Golden Gophers defeats on the season, I’m finding it hard to identify a great trend because all of their 10 loses came against teams that reached the NCAA Tournament. In fact, Minnesota’s 13th place finish in the conference means they were the highest ranked team from the Big 10 that didn’t make the Big Dance. If you’re doing your maths correctly, you should realize this means the Gophers knocked off two eventual NCAA Tournament selections in the form of Illinois, who just got ousted by #1 Texas, and Indiana, who just got ousted by #1 South Carolina. Meanwhile, the Bulldogs only defeated one team that made the Big Dance
Losing against teams like USC, UCLA, Iowa, Maryland, Michigan, Michigan State, Nebraska, Oregon, and Washington (twice) may mean you’re not ready for the primetime in March, but with the resume they currently possess, it should mean they’re a big threat at the second-level like the WBIT.
Does GU have what it takes to take on a school of Minnesota’s stature? Will they have the opportunity for a rematch against Texas Tech who tore up the Zags in the second match of the Paradise Jam 67-49? Do we get more Vonny, Maud, Bree, Tayla, and Esther time? Tune in tomorrow to ESPN+ at 5 pm PST to see the outcome and hit the comments below to give your thoughts.
