Early on in the season, Boston University women’s basketball coach Kelly Greenberg described her team as a “second half team.” At no point has this statement looked truer than in Sunday afternoon’s 53-46 win over Hartford University.
Entering the second half trailing 26-17, the Terriers (14-6, 7-0 America East) bounced back and pulled off a second-half victory against the team that defeated them in the America East title game last March.
After a first frame riddled with missed shots and failures to recover rebounds, the Terriers entered half time knowing that they were going to have to change something about the way they were playing. And after a second half in which they outscored their opponents 36-20, it was clear the Terriers figured something out.
“Our challenge was just to make sure [we] just play our way,” Greenberg said. “We have to be aggressive.”
This intensity proved to be the key to the Terriers’ victory.
Instead of allowing its opponents to control the game and force BU to play it Hartford’s way after the half, BU started to play much better on both ends of the court, forcing the Hawks (11-10, 2-5 America East) to play at the Terriers’ pace.
“[Greenberg] thought we were hurrying just a little bit in the first half,” said junior guard Chantell Alford. “So we just had to take deep breaths and just regroup, gather ourselves so we could play our basketball. And I think that’s what we came out and did in the second half.”
Throughout the second half, BU allowed itself to relax into the game instead of altering its playing style in order to match its opponent.
“We played with a lot more instincts,” Greenberg said. “I really think our team has great instincts. Individually and as a team on defense and the second half our zone really showed it.”
All season, Greenberg has stressed that the key to the Terriers’ success is their strong defense and their ability to recover rebounds. After a first half in which the Hawks had 20 rebounds to the Terriers’ eight, the team knew it wasn’t playing basketball the way that had so consistently worked for them.
“Today having eight rebounds at the half, they really killed us on the boards in the first half and to finish up it was almost equal at the end of the game,” Greenberg said. “And that shows a lot.”
By the end of the game, BU had 28 rebounds to Hartford’s 33.
For the Terriers, the second half was about figuring out a way to successfully keep one step ahead of their opponents. Instead of sticking with one form of defense, they shifted between zone and man, finally settling on zone as it proved most effective against the Hawks.
“You want to mix things up,” Greenberg said. “You don’t want teams to get too comfortable. So if we stayed on man they could get into a rhythm. So it was just a decision [to switch defenses] we made and it ended up being a great decision.”
Both Greenberg and Alford stressed how important the bounce back in the second half of the game was. In large part, that comeback was caused by a change in the attitude of the team.
“I think in the first half we let them dictate how we were going to play, but in the second half we came back and we played our game,” Alford said.
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