Marquette University Athletics
Women's Basketball Jumps Into Heart Of C-USA Slate
1/4/2000 12:00:00 AM | Women's Basketball
Jan. 4, 2000
MILWAUKEE -
COMING UP The Marquette women's basketball team (9-3) hosts a pair of American Division rivals this weekend as Conference USA sees its first full weekend of league play. The Golden Eagles host Louisville in the Milwaukee Arena on Fri., Jan. 7, at 7 p.m. (CT). Marquette closes the first week of the new year by hosting Cincinnati in the Arena on Sun., Jan. 9, at 2 p.m.
ABOUT MARQUETTE Marquette, chosen by many preseason prognosticators to finish in the Top 25 this season, moved up to 26th in both polls last week before losing at Notre Dame on Sun., Jan. 2. The Golden Eagles open a two-game homestand this Friday.
Marquette is currently shooting 41% from the field, 29% from behind the arc and 66% from the free throw line. Marquette?s opponents have converted 39% of their field goals, 28% of their attempts from three-point land and 67% of their free throws.
The Golden Eagles are out-scoring opponents by 3.2 points per game, 67.5-64.3, and are outrebounding their opponents by 0.7 rebounds per game, 40.0-39.3.
After a one-game change, Marquette has returned to the starting lineup that had gotten the call in 38 consecutive contests prior to the Arkansas State game: G- Kiesha Oliver and Kristi Johnson, F - Lisa Oldenburg and Heidi Bowman, C- Abbie Willenborg. Those starters account for 85% of the points (57.5 ppg) and 67% of the rebounds (26.8 rpg) this season.
Willenborg leads Marquette with 16.8 points and 9.3 rebounds per game, and five double-doubles. Oldenburg paces Marquette with 1.6 blocks and 2.9 steals per game, and shoots 59% from the field. Johnson shoots 37% from behind the three-point arc and dishes out 3.6 assists per contest.
ABOUT LOUISVILLE The Cardinals, who joined Marquette, Cincinnati and Tulane atop the C-USA regular-season standings a year ago, is off to a good start again this season at 8-4. Louisville opened its league schedule on Sun., Jan. 2, with a 65-56 victory over rival Cincinnati. Despite playing without All-C-USA candidate Jill Morton, Louisville scored the win with the help of 82% shooting from the free throw line. Sophomore forward Kara Kessans paced the Cardinals with 16 points and also grabbed six rebounds. Morton, a 5-5 shooting guard, leads U of L with 17.5 points per game and shoots 54% from behind the three-point arc and 85% from the charity stripe. She is currently nursing a pulled quad muscle that kept her out of the Cincinnati game. Senior forward Alison Bass leads the squad with 6.7 rebounds per game and averages 12.0 points per contest, while Kessans adds 10.0 and 4.1 rebounds per game.
Co-head coaches Martin Clapp and Sara White are in their third season at the helm of the Cardinals. They have compiled a 49-27 (.645) record.
Louisville leads the all-time series with Marquette 4-3, but the Golden Eagles won both contests last year. Kristi Johnson's career-high 20 points sparked Marquette's 87-71 win in Milwaukee on Jan. 3. Sharon Bellamy went 17-20 from the line and had 27 points in Louisville on Feb. 8, but it wasn't enough as four Marquette starters hit double figures to propel the Golden Eagles to the 70-65 road victory.
ABOUT CINCINNATI Following the 65-56 loss at Louisville on Sun., Jan. 2, head coach Laurie Pirtle's Bearcats are now 6-5, 0-1. They meet DePaul in Chicago on Fri., Jan. 7, before arriving in Milwaukee.
Along with DePaul's Doug Bruno, Pirtle is the dean of the C-USA coaches. The Ohio State graduate has amassed a 170-209 (.449) in 14 seasons at Cincinnati. She has an overall record of 253-225 (.529) in 20 seasons as a head coach.
Cincinnati is led by All-C-USA candidate Madinah Slaise. The 5-10 senior guard/forward is averaging 17.3 points and 6.1 rebounds per game, but missed the Louisville game for personal reasons. Center Laura Wilder, a 6-1 sophomore, is averaging 11.6 points and a team-high 6.8 rebounds per game.
Marquette holds a 12-5 advantage in the all-time series with Cincinnati, but the Bearcats swept all three games last season. Slaise averaged 25 points and Doris Scott added 18.7 points and 12.7 rebounds per game for Cincinnati, which ended Marquette's bid for a C-USA Tournament title with a 77-68 overtime win in the semifinals of the tournament on Feb. 28.
LAST WEEK
Marquette 59, DePaul 36
Marquette opened its Conference USA schedule on a high note on Dec. 30, shutting down a dangerous DePaul squad 59-36 in the Milwaukee Arena. All three members of the Golden Eagles? frontline hit double-digits, and Abbie Willenborg registered her fifth double-double of the season, but it was Marquette?s defensive effort, which held DePaul to 10-60 shooting from the field, that was the game?s real story.
In allowing the Blue Demons only 36 points, Marquette registered its largest margin of victory ever over its longtime rival. The 36 points equaled the lowest single-game total in the history of the DePaul women?s basketball program. The Blue Demons went 2-27 from beyond the three-point arc, and their shooting percentage from the field and from beyond the three-point arc were the lowest by an opponent during Terri Mitchell?s tenure as head coach at Marquette.
?I?m extremely proud of our defensive effort,? Mitchell said. ?And I expect us to continue to keep up that intensity throughout the conference season. We believe an extended zone can be as effective as man defense - and it showed tonight.?
Both teams contributed to an ugly first half, notable only for the fact that Marquette held the Blue Demons scoreless for just over 12 minutes but led by only four.
Marquette came out inspired after the break however, turning up the execution on offense while continuing to smother the potent DePaul attack. While Lisa Oldenburg and Heidi Bowman led the Marquette attack with 13 points each, and Ebony Williams grabbed eight boards off the bench, it was Willenborg who garnered a bulk of the accolades.
The 6-2 senior center finished the game with 11 points and a game-high 15 rebounds, however it was her 13th rebound that mattered the most. That rebound, actually scooped up off the floor after a scramble off a missed shot, gave Willenborg 1,000 career boards. It also made Willenborg the third player in Marquette history to surpass 1,000 points and 1,000 rebounds in her career. C-USA?s all-time leading rebounder now has 1,541 career points and 1,002 career rebounds, and she joins Julie Sievers and Christine Kennedy on the 1,000 point/1,000-rebound plateau.
?We?re fortunate to have a player of Abbie?s caliber,? Mitchell said. ?Not just because she?s an outstanding player, but because of her character and willingness to do whatever it takes to win. I?m not surprised that Abbie reached that accolade.?
Willenborg (two blocks) also joined with Oldenburg (four blocks) in helping the defensive effort. DePaul was led by Lenae Williams? 12 points. But after hitting eight three-pointers and 37 points against Oregon last week, Williams was held without a three (0-9) and went 4-17 from the field.
Marquette improved to 9-2, 1-0 with the win, while DePaul fell to 5-5, 0-1.
#8 Notre Dame 75, Marquette 60
The Marquette women's basketball team dropped its final non-conference game of the regular season on Jan. 2 in South Bend, Ind., losing to eighth-ranked Notre Dame 75-60 in the Joyce Center. All-American center Ruth Riley had 18 points and nine rebounds for the Irish, but it was the backcourt of Niele Ivey and Danielle Green, which combined for 34 points, 10 rebounds and 13 assists, which sparked a 20-7 second-half run that put the Golden Eagles away for good. Heidi Bowman had 15 points for Marquette, which was 9-3 following the loss. Notre Dame improved to 9-2.
"It was an outstanding game in the first half," Marquette head coach Terri Mitchell said. "We had a major lapse in the second half, where, for five minutes we weren't running our offense and weren't getting back on defense. For five minutes. Going into someone else's (gym) and playing against a Top 10 team - you can't have that lapse."
Riley paced Notre Dame to an early lead, hitting the first six points for the Irish. However, a back-and-forth first half saw Marquette race back from a 12-4 deficit in the opening minutes by relying on forwards Lisa Oldenburg and Heidi Bowman. With Abbie Willenborg on the bench with foul trouble, Oldenburg did the work inside, Bowman outside to help the Golden Eagles come back to take a 28-26 lead. Oldenburg tallied eight points and six boards in the opening frame, while Bowman, who has rediscovered her three-point shot following the holiday break, poured in 10 points, including a pair of threes. Ivey gave the Golden Eagles a sign of what was to come in the first half's waning minutes, though, hitting her first three of the game to send Notre Dame into the break up 31-28.
The game remained tight until Riley picked up her third foul with 17:48 remaining. That's when Notre Dame shifted from a half-court team into a fast-breaking squad led by Ivey and Green. Ivey, a senior point guard, scored the next six Irish points and capped off 23-10 run with back-to-back threes that gave Notre Dame a 17-point advantage. The Golden Eagle offense sputtered during this time and wound up shooting 26% after the intermission. Though the Golden Eagles were able to shut down Notre Dame's leading scorer, holding Alicia Ratay to five points, the nationally-ranked Fighting Irish had too many other options.
"We take pride in our defense," Mitchell said. "And obviously Ratay was a point of emphasis. But they have so many weapons that it's hard to focus on any one, because one, or two, or three other players will step up. Ivey changed the game in the second half. She hit some threes and attacked the basket and we couldn't answer."
Ivey finished with game-highs of 19 points and 12 assists to go along with five rebounds. Green had 15 points and five boards. Along with Bowman, both Oldenburg (13 points) and Willenborg (11) reached double-figures. The Golden Eagles were hurt by 4-18 shooting from the backcourt and a 12-rebound disadvantage that proved to be their downfall.
IN THE POLLS Marquette was not ranked in either the USA Today / Coaches' Poll or the AP Poll this week, but was among the top teams receiving votes in both polls.
Several Marquette opponents did receive national recognition this week: Notre Dame is #6 by the coaches and #8 by the AP, while C-USA foe Tulane is #19 by the AP and #20 by the coaches. Arkansas State made its Top 25 debut this week, coming in at #25 (tied) in the AP poll. Drake and Wisconsin are receiving votes from the AP, while Arkansas State and Drake are getting votes in the coaches' poll.
HEAD COACH TERRI MITCHELL Now in her fourth season as head coach, Terri Mitchell is 73-28 (.723) at the helm of the Golden Eagles. Marquette's 21 wins last season made Mitchell the first head coach in the program's history to earn 10 wins or more in each of her first three seasons. She is also the first coach in the program's history to lead the team to a regular-season title, three-consecutive 20-win seasons and three straight appearances in the NCAA Tournament.
Mitchell was named the Conference USA Coach of the Year following the 1997-98 season after leading the Golden Eagles to a 22-7 mark and a second straight NCAA Tournament appearance.
In her debut season of 1996-97, Mitchell led Marquette to a 21-10 record, an 11.5 game turnaround from the Golden Eagles? 8-20 season the year before. The jump marked the largest improvement by a first-year head coach in NCAA Division I that year.
A 1989 graduate of Duquesne, where she was also a four-year letterwinner for the Duchesses? basketball team, Mitchell started her coaching career as a graduate assistant at Arizona State during the 1989-90 season. After a one-year stint as the Director of Camps and Promotions for Future Stars International, Mitchell came to Marquette as an assistant coach in 1991. She served as an assistant at the university until she was named head coach on June 6, 1996.
Mitchell is assisted by Tracey Tarkington, Jon Cain, Michelle Nason and special assistant Kelly Johnson.
WILLEN' AND ABLE Willenborg (Arlington Heights, Ill. / Hersey) became the third player in the history of the Marquette women's basketball program to reach the 1,000-point/1,000 rebound milestone after she surpassed 1,000 career rebounds against DePaul. The 6-2 senior center joined MU alumnae Julie Sievers and Christine Kennedy, and now has 1,552 points and 1,010 rebounds. Willenborg is in fourth place among Marquette's all-time career scoring leaders and is in third on the career rebounding list.
She notched her fifth double-double of the season against DePaul, scoring 11 points to go along with a game-high 15 rebounds. Despite being plagued by foul problems at Notre Dame she still paced Marquette with eight rebounds and also notched 11 points. Conference USA's all-time leading rebounder, Willenborg is currently leads Marquette with averages of 16.8 points and 9.3 rebounds per game. The 6-2 senior center is shooting 42% from the field, 72% from the line and also averages 2.0 assists, 1.4 blocks and 1.6 steals per contest.
SOLID GOLDENBURG After struggling from the field against Arkansas State, Oldenburg (West Allis, Wis. / Hale) found her shooting eye against DePaul. The 6-2 senior went 6-7 from the field, including 1-1 from behind the three-point arc, and tallied 13 points. She also had eight rebounds and collected a season-high four blocks, helping spur a superior defensive effort by the Golden eagles. She also had 13 points and seven rebounds at Notre Dame. Oldenburg continues to lead Marquette and C-USA with a 58% field goal percentage. Oldenburg averages 16.7 points, 7.2 rebounds, 2.4 assists, 1.6 blocks and 2.9 steals per game. Her 42-point performance against Pacific on Nov. 26 is the top single-game point total on the Division I level this season.
Oldenburg is currently fifth on the all-time Marquette career scoring list with 1,384 points. She is seventh among Marquette's career rebounding leaders with 712 boards.
THROWING BOWS After starting the previous 38 games at the small forward spot, Bowman (Piercy, Calif. / South Fork) came off the bench against Arkansas State. However, she returned to the starting lineup last week and responded with her best offensive production of the season. She returned to the opening lineup against DePaul and had 13 points. She went 2-2 from behind the three-point arc against the Blue Demons. The 6-0 junior forward also hit a pair of threes at Notre Dame and led Marquette with 15 points. Bowman sat out this past summer while rehabilitating a sore back and is still playing her way back into shape, but she is averaging 7.8 points, 3.3 rebounds and 1.4 assists per game.
STAT PACK Several Golden Eagles were ranked among the statistical league leaders coming into this week. Abbie Willenborg is seventh in scoring (16.8 ppg), fifth in rebounding (9.3 rpg), seventh in field goal percentage (42%), 11th in free throw percentage (72%), and tied for fourth in blocked shots (1.4 bpg). Lisa Oldenburg is second in the league in field goal percentage (59%), is eighth in scoring (16.7 ppg), ninth in rebounding (7.2), 12th in free throw shooting (72%), fifth in steals (2.9 spg) and third in blocked shots (1.4). Kristi Johnson is sixth in assists (3.6 apg), tied for third in three-point field goal percentage (37%), seventh in three-point field goals made (1.6 3FGpg) and third in assist/turnover ratio (1.54). Kiesha Oliver is tied for 11th in blocked shots (0.75 bpg).
As a team, Marquette is tied for the league lead in blocked shots (5.2 bpg), is third in three-point field goal percentage defense (27.6%), fourth in rebounding defense (39.3 rpg) and fifth in assists (14.8 apg), assist/turnover ratio (0.84), free throw percentage (65.6%) and field goal percentage defense (39.0%).
GOLDEN EAGLES ON THE AIR Select Marquette women's basketball games will be broadcast live on the Marquette Basketball Radio Network by WJYI-1340 AM and WISN-1130 AM this season.
Kent Sommerfeld and Kareeda Chones will call all the action for at least 16 games this season, with at least two others being simulcast. WJYI will carry at least 14 games, with WISN airing at least four. Additional games from the postseason may be added.
The Golden Eagle Pregame Show will start approximately 5-10 minutes before the scheduled tip-off on most dates.
The following games will be carried by WJYI:Jan. 7 Louisville 10 p.m. (tape-delayed)Jan. 20 UAB 7 p.m.Jan. 28 South Florida 7 p.m.Feb. 3 at Southern Miss 7 p.m.Feb. 13 at Louisville 1 p.m.Feb. 18 UNC Charlotte 7 p.m.March 3-6 C-USA Tournament TBA The following games will be carried by WISN:Jan. 9 Cincinnati 2 p.m.Jan. 30 Houston 2 p.m.Feb. 20 Saint Louis 2 p.m.(The broadcast schedule is tentative and subject to change.)
The Golden Eagles will be featured on two nationally-televised games this season. Marquette's Sat., Feb. 5, game at Tulane will be aired by espn2 at 3 p.m. Midwest Sports Channel will pick up FOX Sports Net's broadcast of the Golden Eagles' final game of the regular season, at DePaul on Sat., Feb. 26, at 11 a.m. Midwest Sports Channel also will air the South Florida contest at the Milwaukee Arena on Fri., Jan. 28, at 7 p.m.
QUOTING TERRI MITCHELL: "I'm pleased with where we are at this point in the season with a 9-3 record. Naturally, we wouldn't want to lose any games, but we realize with the type of non-conference schedule we play that there are going to be some tough ones. However, it is that difficult schedule that helps get us ready for Conference USA. The games we have played so far are all to prepare us for what we will see the rest of the way, and I feel that we've responded with some impressive performances and hope that we can continue to do so."
FOR MORE INFORMATION Contact Marquette assistant sports information director Josh Sutter at (414) 288-6980 or at: joshua.sutter@marquette.edu
