The Guru’s Local/National NCAAW Roundup: Princeton Tops Rutgers on Tall’s Career Night; Crooks Leads No. 10 Iowa State Over No. 11 Iowa

By Mel Greenberg @womhoopsguru

PRINCETON, N.J. – The tall tale out of Princeton’s 81-63 win here in Jadwin Gym against nearby Rutgers (7-4) was no lie.

Wednesday night’s narrative, in one of only two local action during finals period, came in the way of Fadima Tall, the 6-1 junior forward from Silver Spring, Md., who had career highs of 28 points and five steals as the Tigers (10-1) completed a sweep of the Big Ten rivals Scarlet Knights and Penn State.

Tall was 7-14 from the field and 4-9 from deep besides a near-perfect 10-11 on the line to collect her scoring totals while grabbing four rebounds.

The board work numbers were the only thing coach Carla Berube thought a bit low, initially, but then noticed that her team shooting 46.3% from the field diminished the number of missed shot opportunities to go after for second chances.

Olivia Hutcherson and Ashley Chea each scored 16 points and Madison St. Rose scored 11 points.

The trends of both teams showed in the final score: Rutgers (7-4) suffering another wide differential loss while Princeton, the top runner up in this week’s Associated Press women’s poll,  again put the hammer down at the finish moving from a single-digit lead after three quarters to outscore the Scarlet Knights 30-19 over the final ten minutes.

At least the visitors had better success finding their way through the nets Wednesday as opposed to the drought Saturday night up the road back home against Iowa in a Big Ten opener at Jersey Mike’s Arena in Piscataway, N.J.

Nene Ndiaye shot 8-14 from the field, scoring 20 points, Kaylah Ivey scored 15, and Imani Lester scored 11.

Berube said looking at film of the Rutgers loss to Iowa was not a heavy concentration considering the size of the Hawkeyes.

“We’re looking more at teams like Stony Brook, Siena, to see how they played against them,” Berube said.

Much of the damage was done in transition, Princeton forcing 23 turnovers as opposed to committing 15 miscues resulting in a 23-11 advantage on points off turnovers.

Both teams head to finals before returning on Dec. 20 with Princeton visiting Atlantic 10 tournament champion George Mason in Fairfax, Va., outside the nation’s capital and hosting Temple, Dec. 22, before opening Ivy League play at Penn in The Palestra on Jan. 3.

Which final did Tall say was personally most difficult?

“Anatomy, because you have to know all about the brain and every (detail) and I have until Tuesday.”

Rutgers hosts Lafayette next and then after the short Christmas break, it’s Big Ten action the rest of the way beginning with a visit from No. 25 Michigan State on Dec. 28.

In the night’s other local action, Delaware’s comeback against George Washington fell short, losing 63-59 at the Bob Carpenter Center in Newark.

Kailah Correa led the host Blue Hens (5-3) with 18 points against the Revolutionaries (6-5), shooting 7-11 from the field, with four assists and three rebounds.

Trinity Vance added 10 points and Ande’a Cherisier was 5-9 from the field for 11 points with five rebounds.

Delaware is off until Wednesday hosting La Salle at 11 a.m. (ESPN+), the program’s annual Education Day event.

The next games involving the 13 local teams are Saturday with Temple hosting VCU at 2 p.m. (ESPN+) in the Liacouras Center, and Rider hosting Wagner the same time (ESPN+) at Alumni Gym in Lawrenceville, N.J., just down the road from here at Princeton.

On Sunday La Salle is at Md.-Eastern Shore at 3 p.m. and Penn State visits No. 3 South Carolina at 3:30 p.m. on ESPN at the Gamecocks’ Colonial Life Arena in Columbia.

The National Scene

The night’s key attraction produced an outcome as close as the rankings of both teams in the current AP women’s poll, an in-state matchup, nationally televised on ESPN in the annual Jimmy V Classic as No. 10 Iowa State (11-0) at home in Ames won the battle of unbeatens besting No. 11 Iowa 74-69.

Audi Crooks continued her sensational season to date, scoring 30 points with 10 rebounds against the Hawkeyes (9-1), while Addy Brown had 20 points and 12 boards, to foil the visitors’ comeback attempt.

Trailing by 17 points late in the third quarter, Iowa took off on a 26-12 run to move within three points near the end of the game.

Taylor McCabe’s three-point attempt to tie the score was blocked by Mackenzie Hare with 16 seconds left in regulation and Crooks then hit a free throw to gain her fourth 30-point game of the season.

Chazadi Wright connected on four makes from deep and totaled 21 points for Iowa, while McCabe’s 11 points were fueled by three makes from beyond the arc. Kylie Feuerbach and Hannah Stuelke each scored 10 points.

Iowa State’s Jada Williams, who had 11 points and five rebounds, also produced a career-high 12 assists, courtesy of Crooks’ scoring, her 78th straight game in double figures for the longest active streak in the nation.

Besides this game assigned the Jimmy V event, it was the annual CyHawk Series of which Iowa holds a 32-24 lead in the series.

The Hawkeyes in Iowa City host Lindenwood on Saturday while Iowa hosts Northern Iowa on Sunday.

The few other ranked teams who played won easy, No. 2 Texas (11-0) won 110-45 at Texas Rio Grande (3-5) in Edinburg as Madison Booker led the Longhorns with a triple double of 28 points, 10 rebounds, and 10 assists. Shooting 14-19 from the field the two-team AP All-American had the sixth triple double in program history.

The visitors owned the paint 60-6 and mined 39 points out of 29 turnovers.

Rori Harmon had a personal best 14 assists for the Longhorns.

Texas’ competition gets tougher next playing in Fort Worth Sunday against No. 13 Baylor. The Bears a former annual Big 12 rival before the Longhorns left last season for the Southeastern Conference.

No. 7 Maryland (12-0), now without three players the rest of the season due to knee injuries, including last season’s Rutgers transfer Kaylene Smikle, downed Delaware State 91-21 at home in the XFinity Center in College Park setting a program record against the visitors (3-8) for fewest opposition points allowed.

Ava McKennie and Lea Bartleme are also sidelined.

Indiana transfer Yarden Garzon and Oluchi Okananwa each scored 18 points for the Terrapins.

The previous low-point in scoring against Maryland came from Morgan State on Feb. 5, 1974.

Delaware State committed 30 turnovers giving Maryland a whopping 45-2 advantage in transition.

The Terrapins were coming out of their double-overtime 100-99 win at Minnesota Sunday in a Big Ten opener in which they scored 10 points in the final minute of the second overtime.

Maryland is off off until a week from Friday hosting Central Connecticut.

No. 22 Louisville (9-3) at home in Kentucky grabbed a 93-62 win over Ball State (8-3) as Skylar Jones scored 20 points and Saint Joseph’s transfer Laura Ziegler scored 15 points.

The visitors Sunday are at mid-major power South Dakota State, which edged host Northern Iowa 59-57, Wednesday, while Louisville in a key Atlantic Coast Conference game the same day hosts No. 12 North Carolina.

In other games of note Wednesday, San Diego State won 64-53 at Kansas State, while Arizona edged visiting Eastern Kentucky 87-83, and host Virginia handled Howard 76-50 at home in Charlottesville.

Thursday night No. 21 Ohio State hosts Northern Kentucky at 6:30 p.m. (B1G+), No. 9 Oklahoma hosts Little Rock at 7 p.m. (SECN+), and No. 19 Notre Dame hosts Morehead State at 7 p.m. (ACCNX).