Remember the holiday classic, “There’s No Place like Home for the Holidays”?
Well, the Boston University women’s basketball team is going to have to warm up to a whole list of places other than home for the holidays.
The Terriers embark on an eight-game road trip starting tonight when they travel to Providence, R.I. to take on Brown University.
Both teams have been on a tear lately, winning a string of games over difficult opponents, BU with four in a row, Brown with a pair. For Brown, this will be its second straight game against an America East team. The Bears (3-3) defeated Stony Brook University last Sunday, 71-62, to win the Brown Classic Championship, while the Terriers (4-1) grounded Long Island University, 72-45.
“They’re one of those teams that doesn’t have great size, but they play a great brand of basketball,” said BU coach Kelly Greenberg. “They’re relentless.”
In its victory, Brown shot 45.8 percent from the floor and an impressive 50 percent from beyond the arc. The Bears are averaging 69.3 points per game through six contests and like to score quickly.
“They’re not afraid to bring the ball down and shoot five seconds into the shot clock,” Greenberg said.
Senior captain Sarah Hayes will provide the toughest test for the Terrier defenders. The 5-foot, 8-inch Ivy League Player of the Week is averaging a team-best 17 points and 6.8 rebounds per game. Hayes was also named the Brown Classic MVP.
“Sarah creates her own shots off the dribble and isn’t really like any of their other guards,” Greenberg said.
What’s even more impressive than Hayes’s numerous awards is that Brown held Mykeema Ford, Stony Brook’s best player, scoreless.
“They held her to zero points,” Greenberg said. “And she would put up 30 in games against us last year. From that alone we know it’s going to be a good match-up.”
The Terriers know they’ll have to deal with that stingy defense when they hit the court at the Pizzitola Sports Center. It’s the second time this season that BU will run into a zone defense. The first time resulted in a victory over the University of Delaware.
“We know they play a lot of zone and they like to press,” Greenberg said. “This game will give us an opportunity to work on our zone defense and our transition game.”
BU will look to captains Rachael Vanderwal and Katie Meinhardt to lead the team as it goes for its fifth straight victory. But, unlike Stony Brook, if the Terrier captains struggle, the rest of the team can pick up the slack. In all of their contests this season, the Terrier bench has contributed an average of 12.8 points per game.
“We’re not thinking about our next game or our last game,” Greenberg said. “Right now we’re only focused on Brown.”
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