No. 21 Hardin-Simmons women's basketball shoots past McMurry in rescheduled Crosstown game
There were no signs of rust on the Hardin-Simmons women's basketball team's offense as it shot its way to an 88-69 win against McMurry on Saturday at the Mabee Complex.
The game was moved up from Jan. 31, after both teams had both games this week canceled — by LeTourneau and Texas-Dallas — due to COVID health and safety protocols. Neither team wanted to wait another week to play, so the move was made.
"I'm really thankful we got a game this week," HSU coach Kendra Hassell said. "It was not ideal to have to move our crosstown rival up, but at the same time we hadn't played since Dec. 16, so you're worried about how rusty your team's going to be and how offensive-minded your team's going to be."
The No. 21 Cowgirls (10-2 overall, 5-2 ASC) shot 50 percent from the floor and were 14 of 29 from the 3-point line as six different players made a shot from beyond the arc.
It started early as Samantha Tatum made three in the first quarter while Brittany Schnabel hit four herself en route to a team-high 20 points. Parris Parmer, Hallie Edmondson and She'Ray Wilson all made two each with Aiken Semones making one.
"Unfortunately, as the coach, I feel like we rely too much on scoring to bring us energy and intensity," Hassell said. "But we definitely respond when we're hitting 3s. We have such good scorers that it could be one person every game or it could be four or five people. This game, it was more the four to five, and we shot at a very high percentage."
McMurry hit a 3-pointer at the buzzer to keep it under a 20-point loss. But the game was even closer than that. Without the second quarter, the War Hawks (0-12, 0-7) played within five points of HSU. But the 22-8 frame was a lesson for the young team.
"We talked about trying to finish quarters, finish halves, finish games," interim McMurry coach Drew Long said. "I think we've grown a lot. We talked about that in the locker room. This team now, compared to where we were four, five weeks ago, when they jumped out on us by 26, I think that would have gone to 30, 35. But was super proud of their effort, they continued to battle, continue to do what we ask them to do."
As the Cowgirls got separation, they did it with defense in the second quarter. HSU held the War Hawks to 3 of 12 shooting from the floor and had an eight-point run in the quarter.
"We really locked down defensively in the second quarter," Hassell said. "I was a little disappointed with our second half defense, giving them some easy looks around the basket. But we kept matching them offensively. It was hard for our team to understand the urgency of the defensive side. Once we were able to stretch it out, we knew our offense was going to carry us."
This year, the War Hawks are winless in 12 games after going 2-16 a year ago. They went through a coaching change this offseason as Brittany Densman-Roes stepped down and Long came in with assistant coach Ayla Adams.
McMurry has six freshmen and sophomores and nine juniors with no seniors on the roster. And with new coaches, even the more experienced players were starting from Square 1.
"We got a late start when we came in, Coach Ayla and I, it was late August, early September," Long said. "Then, with Division III rules, you can't touch them, so we didn't know what we had to work with for the first six weeks. We started with a clean slate. The previous staff brought in 29, so it was a matter of trying to see who fit where and what we could do with it.
"It's hard because you don't have the juniors and seniors that know the offense and can teach the younger ones, everybody's learning from scratch. I think they've done a really good job of buying into what we're teaching. A lot of it is repetition and understanding we want them to make basketball plays."
Destiny Mathews continues to be the leader on offense and scored a game-high 21 points with D'Asia White finishing with 14 and Taya Bridges adding 11.
Even in a loss, it was good for the War Hawks to get back on the court in a game setting before making next week's trip to Sul Ross State and Howard Payne.
"It stinks when you lose two (games on the schedule) in the COVID environment you have to stay on your toes," Long said. "Talking with Kendra, they had a lengthy bit of time (between games) and we had some lengthy time. For us, honestly, it was good because we got to spend some time focusing on us. … It was good to get out here, good to compete, good to play. I'm looking forward to the next games that we've got coming up."
Saturday's matchup was originally scheduled to be a top 25 showdown against No. 19 UTD. Even Thursday's game against LeTourneau was going to be big as another two-loss conference team coming to town.
"It's really hard," Hassell said. "Even the Thursday game against LeTourneau was going to kind of show us where we are, they're a real solid program as well. We'd made it through the entire scout, had done several days of practice for them and then all of a sudden didn't get to play. We're disappointed that we couldn't get those games, but we just have to turn the page."
The Cowgirls are at their best when they get in a rhythm. Whether that's within a game or within the season, getting into the Thursday and Saturday game schedule is important.
That's what is hopefully coming with next week's trips to Howard Payne and Sul Ross.
"We just need some consistent games moving forward," Hassell said. "But we can't count on that, to be honest. Hopefully we learn from a game where we scored 88 points and had 24 turnovers. That's pretty good offensive production. If you take away some of those turnovers, you'd expect to be closer to 100.
"Consistent games will help us navigate certain situations, figuring out how to do some of the little things right that we saw slip at times in the game. It's been so long since we've played."
McMurry men fall to LeTourneau
The McMurry men couldn't overcome a 13-point halftime deficit in Saturday's 97-84 loss to LeTourneau at Kimbrell Arena.
In the second half, the War Hawks (4-8, 2-5) got down even further. The Yellowjackets (11-2, 6-2) grew their lead to as many as 27 points in the second half before the hosts began chipping away.
But McMurry was never able to get it closer than the 13 points it went into the second half down, with that coming on the final shot of the game.
Four War Hawks reached double figures offensively led by Rob Charles with 19 followed by Michael Imariagbe with 16, Elias Garcia with 14 and Nick Moye with 11.
McMurry travels to Sul Ross and HPU next week.
Jordan Hofeditz covers Abilene high schools and colleges, Big Country schools and other local sports. Follow him on Twitter at @jhofeditz. If you appreciate locally driven news, you can support local journalists with a digital subscription to ReporterNews.com.
This article originally appeared on Abilene Reporter-News: No. 21 Hardin-Simmons women's basketball shoots past McMurry
