WBK: Lavender Records Double-Double in 115-30 Win over France – Ohio State Buckeyes
7/1/2009 12:00:00 AM | Women's Basketball
Jantel Lavender scored 16 points and grabbed 12 rebounds in 17 minutes of action
July 1, 2009
COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. — The 2009 USA Women’s World University Games Team (1-0) forced 44 turnovers and shot 56.1 percent from the field (37-66 FGs) to cruise to an easy 85-point, 115-30 win over France (0-1) in its first contest of the 2009 World University Games on Wednesday morning in Belgrade, Serbia.
“We wanted to focus on outworking teams, outrebounding teams significantly, which we did, and taking care of the ball,” said USA and Arizona State University head coach Charli Turner Thorne. “We wanted to be more patient on offense. I thought we did well in all of those areas.
“I was very pleased with our 3-point shooting and our field goal percentage in general, but I still want us to slice and dice a little more against zones.”
Tina Charles (Connecticut / Jamaica, N.Y.) led five U.S. players in double figures with 18 points, including 4-of-4 from the free throw line, and six rebounds. Jantel Lavender (Ohio State / Cleveland, Ohio) tallied a double-double with 16 points and 12 boards, Jacinta Monroe (Florida State / Ft. Lauderdale, Fla.) added 16 points, three rebounds and three steals, Tiffany Hayes (Connecticut / Lakeland, Fla.) tallied 15 points and five steals and Alexis Gray-Lawson (California / Oakland, Calif.) contributed 14 points, including 6-of-6 from the free throw line, along with three rebounds and three assists.
“They kept pushing, kept going hard, regardless of what they score was,” Charles said. “We pressed up in the back court a lot. We were also trying to push the ball in transition.”
With the score tied at 2-2 just two minutes into the first period, a bucket in the paint from Lavender sparked a 19-0 U.S. run that included eight points from Gray-Lawson and three U.S. 3-pointers, and by the 3:40 mark, the USA held a 21-2 advantage. In the first 10 minutes alone, France had coughed up 14 turnovers and was just 3-of-8 from the field.
The next three periods were more of the same as France was outsized and overmatched by the U.S. squad. Overall, the U.S. dominated the glass, grabbing 48 rebounds to France’s 21, racked up 31 points from turnovers, tallied 24 second chance points and scored 56 points in the paint.
The U.S. defense held its opponent to just 27.1 shooting from the field (13-48 FGs) and sent France to the line for a total of six free throw attempts.
“We come from top programs and, obviously, we all know how to stay focused during games like this,” Gray-Lawson said. “We just tried to stay focused, play our game and work on things that we need to work on to get better.”
In the second period, eight scorers helped the USA improve its advantage to 56-15 by the time the halftime buzzer had sounded. In the third quarter, the USA held France to just one field goal and two made free throws to build a 65-point lead, 84-19, headed into the final stanza.
Six points from both Charles and Lavender in the fourth period helped the USA outscore France 31-11 to capture the win. With 39.7 seconds remaining on the clock, Jeanette Pohlen (Stanford / Brea, Calif.), who also contributed a game-high five assists and grabbed four steals, sank two free throws and became the 11th U.S. player to record points in the game.
Ta’Shia Phillips (Xavier / Indianapolis, Ind.) netted eight points and eight rebounds; Danielle McCray (Kansas / Olathe, Kan.) tallied nine points; Ashley Houts (Georgia / Trenton, Ga.) scored eight points, dished out four assists and collected three steals; Danielle Robinson (Oklahoma / San Jose, Calif.) had three assists, three rebounds and four steals to go with three points; and Kayla Pedersen (Stanford / Fountain Hills, Ariz.) added six points, four boards and two steals. Pedersen also was a perfect 4-of-4 from the charity stripe.
“We had a great time out there,” Monroe said. “We stayed together, we were talking and we finally put everything together that we’ve been working on since trials and camp.”
Due to a sore knee, Maya Moore (Connecticut / Lawrenceville, Ga.) did not play and is listed as day-to-day. She will be further evaluated this afternoon.
France was led by seven points from Aurelie Carmona.
Turner Thorne is assisted on the USA sideline by Suzy Merchant of Michigan State University and Julie Rousseau of Pepperdine University.
The U.S. squad continues preliminary play against Great Britain on July 2 at 12:30 p.m. (6:30 a.m. EDT); followed by host Serbia on July 3 at 5:30 p.m. (11:30 a.m. EDT). Second round action takes place July 5-7, the medal semifinal round will be played on July 9 and the medal finals will be played on July 11.
In today’s other games, Great Britain (1-0) beat Serbia (0-1) 72-63 in Pool A; Australia (1-0) topped Japan (0-1) 112-69 and Slovakia (1-0) beat Canada (0-1) 85-79 in Pool B; Russia (1-0) beat Mozambique (0-1) 105-52 and Taiwan (1-0) topped Hungary (0-1) 73-64 in Pool C; and Pool D saw Poland (1-0) top China (0-1) 83-73 and Czech Republic (1-0) beat Turkey (0-1) 107-55.
Release courtesy of USA Basketball
