Guru’s WBB Report: Fourth Quarters Big For Saint Joseph’s But Bad for La Salle in A-10 Road Win and Loss; No. 6 Stanford Still Perfect at 69-0 Over Washington State

By Mel Greenberg @womhoopsguru

On their dual weekend road trips that had first stops Friday to New England in the Atlantic 10 Conference, the fourth quarter was thrived by Saint Joseph’s in a 76-69 victory over UMass in the Mullin Center in Amherst while La Salle’s defense fell apart in the Ryan Center in a 75-60 loss to Rhode Island that gave the Rams a season sweep on the Explorers following the win in Philadelphia at the start of this month and the new calendar year.

The games were the only ones involving local teams on a day light all around in the wake of the previous heavy 24 hours despite the numerous ongoing cancellations and postponemdents caused by the COVID-19 protocols.

While La Salle is completing a set of series on this trip, the games back home were postponed for the Hawks (5-1, 3-1 A-10), who themselves were in shut down quarantine at the time.

In Saint Joseph’s game Friday, the Hawks were tied 51-51 with UMass (10-4, 6-3) after three quarters and then erupted for a 13-2 run to grab the victory.

“This is a great road win against a very talented UMass team,” Saint Joseph’s veteran coach Cindy Griffin said. “We played, really smart, tough, and gritty.

“Our offensive efficiency was a combination of inside and outside production, which is growth from our last game. We need to keep growing as a team, and I know we will.”

This is Griffin’s squad’s first road trip of the season, the Hawks were shut down two weeks ago off a positive result within the Tier 1 category from daily testing and when the two host teams were in Philadelphia, the squad was in the middle of a three-week shutdown.

For all of this and the fact before a different future hit everyone and Saint Joseph’s was picked at the bottom of the 14-team conference at 13th ahead of just George Mason in the preseason coaches’ poll, the Hawks at the moment are near the top in the A-10 standings, though they have a ways to go to reach the 13-game requirement to be eligible for the NCAA tournament.

However, if they keep winning and become close enough they could be in position to gain a waiver if all the other traditional numbers produces a tournament-worthy profile as an at-large pick if they don’t win the conference.

As for the numbers out of Friday, grad forward Alexis Santarelli, shooting 7-of-12 from the field, and grad guard Alexis Gribble, shooting 6-of-10 from the field, including 3-of-7 from beyond the arc, each scored 15 points, while Lovin Marsicano, propped by 7-of-8 from the line, scored 12, and reserve Katie Mayock was 4-of-5 from the field, scoring 11 points.

Kaliah Henderson just missed scoring in double digits, collecting nine points while Katie Jekot dealt six assists.

In the third period, the Hawks were trailing 44-38 when they unleashed an 8-0 run to get back into contention heading into the final quarter.

Destiny Philoxy gave the Minutewomen a one-point lead before Saint Joseph’s then broke away on the decisive run and finished holding the home team to 3-of-8 from the field and no threes in three attempts in the closing 2:20 of regulation in the contest.

Saint Joseph’s will look to gain a weekend sweep Sunday when the squad finishes the trip at Rhode Island in the Ryan Center in Kingston at 1 p.m., televised on the ESPN+ streaming apps.

That’s the same place where things did not go as well Friday for La Salle (8-8, 4-5 A-10), which entered the contest winning 5-of-8 but had a close contest get away, yielding 31 points in the final period to Rhode Island (6-5, 6-2), which is under second-year coach Tammi Reiss, the backcourt mate of South Carolina coach Dawn Staley in their days in the early 1990s playing for the Virginia powerhouse squad.

La Salle seemed to be going great when the Explorers reached the half with a 33-26 advantage and managed to end the third period still ahead by a point.

But the mythical roof fell in over the final 10 minutes in terms of the defense.

Kayla Spruill scored 18 for La Salle, shooting 8-for-14 and scoring 18 points, while grabbing seven rebounds, while Claire Jacobs scored 15 points, and Molly Masciantonio’s night gave her 10 points, fueled by 4-of-7 from the field. Haleigh Hill had a team-high eight rebounds.

Rhode Island got a double double 21 points and 10 rebounds from Emmanuelle Tahane, while Marie-Paule Foppossi scored 19, Catherine Cairns scored 17, and Marta Vargas scored 13.

Coach Mountain MacGillivray’s squad will try to gain a split on the weekend Sunday when La Salle visits UMass at 1 p.m. on ESPN+.

National View: Stanford Sweeps Washington State:  All the action of note was in the PAC-12 where No. 6 Stanford in the afternoon won at Washington State 77-48 in the Cougars’ Beasley Coliseum in Pullman, completing a sweep to run the Cardinal’s all-time perfect record in the series to 69-0. That includes a lopsided win Wednesday at the same site, the first time since 1988 coach Tara VanDerveer’s squad played the same opponent consecutively.

Though Anna Wilson only had three points for Stanford (14-2, 11-2 PAC-12), VanDerveer lauded her defense for holding Washington State’s star freshman Charlisse Leger-Walker out of New Zealand to two points, which is 17 off her average.

“Anna Wilson’s defense was phenomenal,” VanDerveer said. “She;s a lockdown defender ... Her defense really sets the tone for our team.”

Haley Jones and Kiana Williams each scored 16 points in the latest game in the series that dates back to 1983. Ashlen Prechel had 11 in the third straight win for the Cardinal since losses of two straight dropped them out of the top five in the rankings.

However, if they win in Seattle at Washington Sunday, they are likely to return in the wake of the upset losses Thursday night to No. 2 North Carolina State and No. 3 Connecticut. 

“Our three-point shooting was really good this afternoon, “ said VanDerveer of the nine-of-19 from deep.

Washington State (8-6, 6-6) got a career high 17 points from Bella Murekatele. Ula Moluga scored 10.

Cameron Brink for the visitors blocked five shots, grabbed five rebounds, and scored six points.

VanDerveer, who passed the late legendary Tennessee coach Pat Summitt last month, extended her all-time Division I women’s record win total to 1,108. Connecticut’s Geno Auriemma also passed Summitt earlier this month and is currently at 1,101, having been stalled Thursday night in the upset loss at No. 19 Arkansas. The Huskies will be at No. 17 DePaul  in Chicago Sunday returning to their Big East slate.

Summitt was at 1,098 victories when she retired at the end of the 2012 season, fighting Alzheimer’s Disease, which ultimately claimed her life several years later.

Stanford has not  been on campus all season due to what had been stringent protocols combating the virus in Santa Clara County in the Bay Area of Northern California.

The Cardinal recently had been using Santa Cruz as an adopted home site but Governor Gavin Newsom eased the restrictions this week so Stanford will be back in Maples Pavilion for the first time this season next Friday hosting Utah, barring further disruptions.

Elsewhere in the PAC-12, No. 11 Oregon announced Friday the program had entered a pause off testing and the weekend games at Utah and Sunday at Colorado have been postponed. Apparently likewise for for No. 10 Arizona, which was to be at Southern Cal, Friday, and at a showdown go for a sweep game at No. 8 UCLA Sunday.

No. 25 South Dakota State, which returned to the Associated Press rankings this week, was to be agt Denver Friday night but that game is now listed as cancelled.

UCLA did play Friday night and narrowly turned back an upset bid from Arizona State, winning 60-57 at home in Pauley Pavilion in the Westwood section of Los Angeles.

Charisma Osbourne, who came up huge in last week’s Bruins upset of Stanford, had 27 points for UCLA (10-2, 8-2 PAC-12) against the Sun Devils, scoring 13 of them in the fourth quarter after the home team had squandered away an 18-point lead in the second and third quarters.

Reserve Emily Bessor contributed 12 points.

Taya Hanson was the sole player in double figures for Arizona State (8-5, 4-5), scoring 12 points.

Near the end of the third quarter the entire huge lead had been erased on Hanson’s shot to give the Sun Devils a 40-38 lead with 1:59 remaining in the period until Michaela Onyenwere tied it going into the final 10 minutes.

The Bruins ultimately won their fifth straight when Hanson missed a shot on Arizona State’s final possession.

With the Sunday Arizona game postponed, UCLA next heads to Pullman Friday at 3 p.m. to play Washington State, which recently forced overtime before losing to the Bruins in their previous meeting. 

Arizona State, however, will on Sunday gets to play a game, completing the trip to Los Angeles by visiting Southern Cal at 4 p.m. at the Galen Center.

Looking Ahead: Locally, several teams begin back-to-back same opponent weekend games Saturday per the way their respective conferences have either scheduled or using the same to plug in previous proposed meetings.

In the Colonial Athletic Association Delaware, which is unbeaten in conference play, visits Elon at at 1 p.m. in North Carolina and then returns to the Schar Center Sunday at 1 p.m., while Drexel is in Boston playing Northeastern at noon on the Solomon Court at Cabot Center and then back Sunday at noon, all four games on the Flohoops apps streaming site.

In the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference, Rider in a switch is now at Central New Jersey rival Monmouth in the OceanFirst Bank Center in West Long Branch at 2 p.m. on ESPN3 and then on Sunday also at 2 p.m. is back the same time but on ESPN+. The Broncs, who have struggled this season, are coming out of an upset win over Quinnipiac.

In the American Athletic Conference, Temple to promulgate a previous postponed game on the part of the opposition is in New Orleans to meet Tulane, Saturday in the Green Wave’s Aaron B. Fogelman Arena in the Devlin Fieldhouse at 1 p.m. on ESPN+ and then back Sunday at noon on ESPNU.

In the Big East, Villanova Sunday is at Butler in Hinkle Fieldhouse in Indianapolis at noon on the Big East Digital Network/Flohoops Apps streaning site.

In the Big Ten, Penn State is at Purdue at 1 p.m. in Mackey Arena in West Lafayette, Ind. Rutgers continues to be in pause, though so is No. 12 Michigan, which had been scheduled to visit the Scarlet Knights on Monday night.

As previously mentioned in the game stories, on Sunday in the Atlantic 10, La Salle is finishing its New England road trip at UMass, while Saint Joseph’s is at Rhode Island.

Penn and Princeton, of course, have been shut down all winter, per the Ivy decision to cancel the season for the Ancient Eight and all other sports on the winter calendar.

With No. 13 South Florida in the American hosting Cincinnati and the second No. 25 South Dakota State at Colorado also shut down, the only two games Saturday with ranked teams has No. 24 West  Virginia making a Big 12 visit to TCU at 2 p.m. in Fort Worth, Texas, in the Ed and Rae Schollmaier Arena on the Big12/ESPN+ apps, and No. 18 Gonzaga in a West Coast Conference game at St. Mary’s at 4 p.m. in the University Credit Union Pavilion in Moraga, Calif.

On Sunday among the ranked teams, in besides DePaul hosting UConn in a first-ever women’s game on the main FOX sports network at 1 p.m., in the Southeastern Conference, No. 4 South Carolina hosts Alabama at 3 p.m.; No. 15 Kentucky hosting Missouri at at 1 p.m.; No. 20 Tennessee hosting Florida at 2 p.m.; No. 19 Arkansas fresh off its non-conference upset of UConn, hosting Auburn at 3 p.m.; and No. 8 Texas A&M hosting Georgia at 5 p.m.

In the Big Ten, there’s a one-day delay till Monday when No. 23 Northwestern hosts No. 14 Ohio State, the visiting Buckeyes playing their fourth straight ranked team in the conference, having gone 3-0 in the stretch.

In the Big 12 Sunday, No. 9 Baylor at 4 p.m. on ESPN2 is at Iowa State, playing the Cyclones squad that beat the Bears at the end of the regular season, snapping a Big 12 win streak of 35 games, and then beating them again earlier this month to snap a 61-game home court win streak.

Also on Monday night in the Atlantic Coast Conference, which will no longer be a 1-2 matchup by then with the next poll released early in the afternoon top-ranked Louisville, the last unbeaten ranked team, and one of only three left in Division I, will host North Carolina State at  p.m. on ESPN 2.

And that’s the report.