After a weekend that began with a powerful come-from-behind victory against Providence College and ended with a disappointing loss to the University of Massachusetts-Amherst, the Boston University women’s basketball team (1-1) will face the University of Richmond (2-0) on Friday night in its third game of the season.
Richmond’s season has been off to a strong start, as both of its victories have come with a double-digit point difference. The Spiders have outscored their opponents 133-96 so far this season and it will be the job of the Terriers defense to shut down the high-scoring team.
In its first game of the season against the United States Naval Academy, Richmond had a breakout second half, which started with a 13-2 run that set the momentum for the rest of the game.
Guards Rachael Bilney and Abby Oliver led the team’s scoring and set the rapid pace of the second half.
Nine Richmond players scored in the game, which ended with a final score of 56-39.
Richmond’s second game of the season, against the College of William and Mary, had an even higher final score as the Spiders won the game 77-57.
Richmond dominated most of the game, and with a little more than 15 minutes left, the Spiders took a 12-point lead that William and Mary would never come back from.
Five Richmond players scored in the double digits.
“Traditionally they’re good year in and year out,” said BU head coach Kelly Greenberg. “We expect their guards to be very solid.”
Richmond’s strongest player so far this season has undoubtedly been Oliver. She leads the team with 29 points and is only eight points away from becoming Richmond’s 18th player to score 1,000 points.
Oliver has reached double digits in both of Richmond’s games this season.
“Abby Oliver is very good,” Greenberg said. “We’re going to key in on her a little bit.”
Coming off an exhausting weekend, the Terriers are working to keep up their good rebound numbers and to get back in the right mindset to defeat a strong team like Richmond.
“We know that we didn’t play even close to our best on Sunday,” Greenberg said. “We had a good day off on Monday. We’re raring to go. It will be a really tough game.”
This early in the season the team is focusing less on specifics and more on team building. With the lineup still not completely set, Greenberg is focusing on figuring out who plays well together and how well the team works as a whole.
Offensively, the Terriers struggled at times this weekend and they have been working in practice this week to tweak the problems they have faced in an effort to improve by the time of Friday’s game against a high-scoring team like Richmond.
Greenberg is still optimistic after Sunday’s disappointing loss.
“We showed a lot of resiliency in both games,” Greenberg said. “I thought we really showed great character. That is what I’m most excited about this team coming forward.”
Despite the distance between Boston and Richmond, Va., Greenberg does not believe the traveling will affect the team negatively.
“It’s out first trip of the season. It’s something we have to get used to,” Greenberg said. “We like it in a way – traveling together, the team has a lot of fun.”
Two of the Terriers’ players, junior guard Kristen Sims and sophomore guard Melissa Gallo, are both from Virginia and, according to Greenberg, they see the game as kind of homecoming, one that she hopes doesn’t distract the players and her team heading into the pivotal game.
“We’re going to take it one possession at a time,” Greenberg said of Friday’s game. “Not get too anxious.”
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