The University of Memphis women’s basketball team (10-9, 4-4 AAC) cast aside its recent offensive struggles and lit up the scoreboard in an 84-49 victory over the Houston Cougars (6-13, 1-7 AAC) at Elma Roane Fieldhouse Saturday afternoon.
Prior to the win against Houston the Tigers had scored just 41 points in a win over Cincinnati and 38 points in a blowout loss to East Carolina. But against the Cougars Memphis wasted no time getting on the scoreboard, opening the contest on an 18-2 run that put the game out of reach nearly as soon as it had begun.
“I’m going to take a little bit of the responsibility,” Memphis coach Melissa McFerrin said of the team’s poor offensive play entering the Houston game. “We’ve not been shooting the ball real well, and quite honestly I think I was too restrictive. So this week we really kinda talked about opening our eyes back up and reading and being confident shooters and attacking the basket, and they really took it to heart.”
A willingness to push the pace was a major reason for Memphis’ offensive explosion. The Tigers looked to get the ball up the floor quickly on nearly every Houston missed shot or turnover, and on the other end of the ball they were able to limit the Cougars’ transition opportunities. The effort showed in the box score, with Memphis notching 25 fast break points while Houston failed to score a single breakaway bucket.
“At the beginning of the week Coach Melissa, she got onto us about getting our tempo back and attacking.” Junior guard Ariel Hearn said. “We talked about the whole week how we just felt like we were losing ourselves on offense. Our defense had picked up and our defense turned into our offense and I think that went hand-in-hand tonight.”
The fast-paced play was not without faults, however, as especially at times throughout the first half the Tigers threw errant passes while trying to move the ball up the court. The pace resulted in some sloppy play from both sides, with Memphis turning the ball over 26 times while forcing 23 Houston turnovers.
The Tigers were able to makeup for the lost possessions by dominating the rebounding battle and playing a stifling zone defense. Memphis out-rebounded the Cougars 49-25 and held Houston to 26 percent shooting from the field. It was a team-wide rebounding effort for the Tigers, who didn’t have a single player record double-digit boards. Junior forward Brianna Wright was the team’s rebounding leader with nine, and seven different Tigers grabbed at least four rebounds.
Hearn led Memphis offensively with 21 points on an efficient 7-13 shooting mark while also adding seven assists and four three-pointers and was named to the AAC Weekly Honor Roll for her performance. Redshirt sophomore guard Mooriah Rowser broke out of her recent slump, scoring 14 points on 7-13 from the field.
Rowser didn’t score a single field goal in her two previous games, and hadn’t scored in double-figures since a Dec. 31 loss to South Florida. She opened the season with five straight games of 13 points or more, but has been inconsistent since.
According to McFerrin, Rowser put in extra work in the gym to try to get back to the form she had at the beginning of the season, and it showed in the win.
“I think it was a mindset that she was going to be aggressive,” McFerrin said. “Typically if you take care of your fundamentals and your mechanics and you’re aggressive and confident then the ball is going to go in the hole, and it did today.”
Memphis is back in action Wednesday night as the Tigers hit the road to attempt to complete a season sweep of the struggling Cincinnati Bearcats (5-14, 2-6 AAC). Memphis and Cincinnati will tip-off at 6 p.m. Wednesday at Fifth Third Arena.