As Krista Clement pushed the ball up the court, Maine broke into a zone-defense, just as it had throughout the game, hoping to shut the Wolverines down offensively as many other teams had succeeded in doing.
Yet, the Black Bears had no such luck. With no one able to find a shot and the shot clock winding down, the Wolverines continued to efficiently rotate the ball around the perimeter until Clement dished the rock inside to Kelly Helvey. As the zone drew in to guard Helvey, she quickly threw the ball out to Ta’Shia Walker, who was standing at the right wing. Walker hit the three when Maine’s zone couldn’t come out fast enough. And with two minutes left in the game, Michigan (3-4) had its biggest lead of the half, going up 67-53.
“We really focused in practice on taking care of the basketball and working against a 2-3 zone,” Clement said. “In a lot of our games we struggled against that and Coach (Cheryl) Burnett worked in a lot of new aspects against a zone.”
After the team’s “shell-shocking” loss to Central Michigan, as Burnett put it, the Wolverines knew they had much to improve on – and ball rotation was at the top of their list. Their inability to pass the ball around the perimeter effectively – and either kick it to the wing or pass it inside for a lay-in – has caused the Wolverines to fear the zone defense. Heading into its game against Maine (2-3) Michigan was averaging more than 20 turnovers and found its offensive productivity slowly deteriorating.
All of that changed in the Wolverines’ 68-60 victory over the Black Bears, which featured a solid combination of inside scoring with penetration along with long-range jump shots.
For the first time this season, Michigan’s assist-to-turnover ratio was above 1.0 as the team went on to have a season-low 13 turnovers. Walker’s game-high 24 points were the result of a balance of inside and outside scoring. Several of her mid-range jump shots came off Clement passes that were made possible by drawing Maine away from the post.
“We have a lot of kids taking some really good shots that I call rhythm jump shots,” Burnett said. “Whenever our team is taking rhythm jump shots we are executing well and we are going to have a better field goal percentage besides the fact that we got the ball inside a lot. I am one of these coaches where you have to go inside to out and that also helped because it gave everyone a lot of confidence.”
On the other end of the court, the Wolverines were finally able to bring all aspects of their scramble defense together, holding the Black Bears for seven minutes without a field goal, giving up with barely a minute left in the game. Helvey was the backbone of Michigan’s defense as usual, pulling down 13 boards to complete her double-double with 13 points on the night. But, it was her 10 defensive rebounds that eliminated many put-back chances for Maine, who, after shooting just 38.5 percent was only able to convert 11 points from offensive rebounds the entire game.
The team’s improved communication allowed them to successfully run the scramble, something they have struggled with so far this season. With the Wolverines in a disguised zone defense they were able to force Maine into three shot-clock violations while causing the Black Bears to have 18 turnovers, of which Michigan was able to convert into 11 points.
“We really worked on our communication (this past week),” Helvey said. “That really pushed us through to the end. We kept talking and staying positive and continued to fight to the end.”