This is a look at the week ahead in women's college basketball. Each week Skim Milkey will be providing five players to keep an eye on, five teams to watch this week, five stats, five games you wouldn't think to keep tabs on, and five tweets.
5 Players I Have My Eye On
McKinna Brackens
Brackens has been great this year for an Arizona State team that just lost their first game of the season on the road at BYU. She certainly had an off-game in that one, but prior to that, she was brilliant in Big 12 play, as she was coming off of a 31-point outburst against Utah in a win. Brackens seems to play her best when she's counted on the most, as she has notched her three highest offensive ratings in the three games where she's been utilized the most. Arizona State plays both UCF and TCU this week, and Brackens will need to play her best game of the year to provide an upset against TCU.
Avery Howell
Washington has quite the upside this season, and a lot of that potential hinges on how USC transfer Howell plays. In the two games since the holiday break, Howell has scored 55 points across the two Big Ten games they have played. She had 22 points and 16 rebounds in an upset win over Michigan last week, which might propel Washington towards a nice run in their early conference slate. Washington has two games this week, one against Michigan State and the other against Purdue. If Howell is able to put up two 20+ point performances once again, then Washington is going to be very tough to beat.
Aaliyah Collins
Collins is relied upon by High Point heavily, as evidenced by her 31.4 usage rate, but she's been excellent when her team has needed her to be. She plays with energy on both ends of the floor and has a steal rate of above 5%. Her assist rate is 36.8%, which is also a very good mark for her on the offensive end of the floor. Collins has transformed her game this season and is having the best year of her career by far. With two winnable games this week, it'll be a solid week for Collins to build on the momentum that she's built so far.
Alejandra Zuniga
Zuniga scored 24 points in her first game this year, and it looked like she was going to come out this season with guns blazing. She had a 'rough' second game, as she had 12 points and seven assists, and then was hurt in the third game of the year, forcing her to miss six games and the bulk of November. Since coming back, she's been nothing short of brilliant, as she has scored 15 or more points in each game since her injury, including a 39-point masterpiece on New Year's Day on the road at UMBC. She is a crucial player to the success of NJIT this season. They have a tough week this week with two games against New Hampshire and Maine, and Zuniga will have to show up to go 2-0 this week.
Emma Smith
Smith has completely transformed her game this year. Last season her offensive rating was 92.0, and this season her offensive rating is at 113.9. After transferring from Denver to Appalachian State, her game has improved quite a bit in all of the margins. Her assist rate is up, her true shooting percentage is up, and her box score plus/minus is eight points higher than last year. Smith has found an excellent fit for herself, and she's making the most of it, as she's scored 10 or more points five times this season. As she continues to gain consistency, it will only make Appalachian State better throughout the season.
5 Teams to Watch This Week
Utah
Utah is coming off of a big week where they upset TCU at home in overtime but also lost to an unbeaten Arizona State. The TCU win could give them some momentum heading into the thick of Big 12 play as they now sit at 2-1 in conference with a pair of away games this week. They head onto the road to take on Kansas and Kansas State and will need to go 2-0 if they are going to look to compete with the upper half of the conference. Utah proved they can handle the best teams in the conference, and now they need to prove that they can sustain it.
Massachusetts
Massachusetts is one of the best teams in the MAC this year, and they are playing excellent basketball so far this season. They sit at 11-2 but have two losses that they probably should not have picked up. Regardless, they are sitting in a good spot right now in conference play as they head into a week where they must go 2-0. They are visiting Miami (OH) and hosting Central Michigan this week, and both games are against teams that have shown flashes of being solid. I am a big believer in UMass this year, and they'll need to get through the week continuing to prove it on the floor.
Murray State
One of the best teams in the Missouri Valley this year is Murray State, and the conference was thought to be in a down year this season. But last week Murray State played two double overtime games against Illinois State and Bradley. Both were good wins, and now Murray State hosts Northern Iowa and Drake for a pair of games this week. Northern Iowa is one of the teams that will be competing at the top of the conference this year, so a win is paramount. Drake isn't as good as they have been, but they can still shoot it well and can be dangerous if they get hot.
Davidson
Davidson is one of the best teams in the Atlantic 10 this year, and they come upon a very important week for the conference race and their at-large tournament hopes. They likely are already out of contention of receiving an at-large bid to the tournament unless they win the rest of their games this season but could get their resume back on the potential list if they beat both Saint Joseph's and Richmond this week. The game at Richmond is their toughest game left this season, and if they are able to snag a win in that game, then they will be at the forefront of the discussion in the A10.
Duke
I think everyone knows the story about Duke this year. They started out poorly, going 3-6 through their first nine games. They had an offensive rating in the 40s and a defensive rating in the 30s. But over the past month they've been much better and hold a top 10 offense and defense in the country. They have played their last six games nearly flawlessly and now head into a tough week where they make their trip out West to take on Stanford and California. If they are able to bring home two wins this week, then Duke is going to hop back on to a lot of radars.
5 Stats to Know
1
I've been tracking Emma Shumate's turnover numbers here over the past few weeks, and she finally ended up turning the ball over yesterday in their game against Indiana for the first time all year long. She is now up to 280 minutes this year with just a single turnover, which is easily the NCAA record for most minutes played with just a single turnover. Just an incredible achievement to only have a single turnover in what would amount to seven full games.
74.0%
Penn State's Gracie Merkle and Iowa State's Mackenzie Hare both have a 74.0% true shooting percentage this year, which leads the entire country. Both have proven to be extremely efficient with their shots and have done a great job of not forcing bad shots this year. It's even more impressive that Hare has gathered such a high TS% even with only attempting six shots from inside the arc.
41.2%
UConn currently leads the entire country in 3-point shooting percentage, and they have four players with high-volume shooting over 42.0% from the perimeter. If UConn continues their torrid pace shooting the ball this season, then they aren't going to be beaten by anyone anytime soon.
15.6%
This jumped off the page at me quickly when I saw it, as this number is the block percentage for Julia Dalan when she's on the floor for Portland. She's averaging nearly four blocks per game this year and has proven herself to be one of the better rim protectors in the country.
2
Yale is the only team in the country that has two players averaging more than 35 minutes per game. This stat mainly means nothing, but I was a little surprised that Ciniya Moore and Luisa Vydrova are the only pair of teammates in college basketball to have played 35 or more minutes per game.
5 Games to Monitor
1/5 - Minnesota @ Michigan
This is going to be an extremely solid game on a night when there isn't much basketball to be played. Both of these teams have struggled on offense at times, and both have proven to be great rebounding teams. This might be a game where the first team to 55 wins; regardless of the score, this game will have quite the impact on the outcome of the Big Ten title.
1/6 - Oregon @ USC
Again, another great conference matchup from the historically strong basketball conference, the Pac-12. Oh, wait, no, I mean the Big 10! Stupid. Regardless of the conference, this is going to be an excellent game where both teams are going to try and muck it up. I'm extremely interested to see how Oregon guard Katie Fiso fares on the road and if she can rise to the occasion.
1/7 - James Madison @ Georgia Southern
Mid-major hoops is really good, and this year, surprisingly, it seems like we are getting multiple incredible games from the mid-major ranks every night. This game is going to be a battle between two teams who play different styles. One wants to play fairly fast, and the other wants to slow it down quite a bit. Georgia Southern never turns it over, but they can't grab any defensive rebounds. James Madison loves to allow teams to hit 3-pointers but is one of the best teams in the country at defending inside the arc. I love the Sun Belt.
1/10 - Columbia @ Harvard
Columbia is fresh off potentially the biggest upset in Ivy League history as they fell to #290 Cornell, a game that they had a 99% chance at winning from the opening tip. Alas, upsets happen, and maybe that is the spark that Columbia needs to steer its ship back on course. Harvard has shown the ability to play excellent defense this year, but sometimes the offense doesn't travel. Last year, this game would have been a big game for the health of the Ivy League, but this year it's just another competitive game, as the league has played itself back into being a one-bid league.
1/10 - Eastern Kentucky @ Central Arkansas
I enjoy watching both of these teams play, and I'm tired of talking about Power Four teams, so I'm going with yet another mid-major matchup. Both of these teams are extremely similar defensively, as they allow an effective FG% of between 41.0% and 41.2%, they turn the ball over 19.4% of the time, and they both are in the top 30 in 3-point FG% allowed. This game is going to be close, and it's going to be a fun game on Saturday.
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