Women's Basketball Heads To No. 5 Duke
11/17/2006 12:00:00 AM | Women's Basketball
Nov. 17, 2006
Duke-Houston Game Notes in PDF Format
Download Free Acrobat Reader
Cougars Head To Cameron Indoor To Face No. 5 Duke ...
• Coming off a 69-51 loss to Texas Tech to open the season the University of Houston women's basketball squad must regroup as the Cougars head out on their first road trip of the season.
• The competition does not get any easier as UH faces No. 6/5 Duke on Sunday at 1 p.m. CST in Cameron Indoor Stadium.
• Duke, coming off its 12-straight NCAA Tournament apperance, is 2-0, knocking off Northeastern (102-49) and Marist (71-50) to open the campaign.
• Abby Waner and Carrem Gay are both averaging 15.0 ppg, with Bridgette Mitchell and Alison Bales on their heels with a 10.0 ppg clip.
• Mitchell is averaging a team-high 10 rebounds per game with Gay and Bales each pulling down eight per contest.
• Duke is a +37 in the scoring margin and a +25 on the rebounding margin, so UH must improve on its 32.8 percent effort from the season opener. • Live stats will be available on www.GoDuke.com.
Free Internet Audio Stream Available To All Fans ...
• Courtesy of ISP Sports and Yahoo.com, all University of Houston women's basketball games will be available live via the internet at no cost to the Cougar faithful.
• Simply log onto www.UHCougars.com, go to the women's basketball schedule and click the audio link next to each game on the schedule to listen for free.
• Jeremy Branham returns for his second season as the play-by-play voice of the Cougars. Louis Ray will join him as a color commentator for home games at Hofheinz Pavilion.
Duke-Houston Game Available Via Broadband Online ...
• Houston's game at Duke on Sat. Nov. 19 will be available for viewing online at www.ACCSelect.com. The game is slotted for a 1 p.m. CST start from Cameron Indoor Stadium.
• ACCSelect.com, the new broadband network providing live and on-demand video of ACC sporting events, continues to offer online coverage of games not available anywhere else.
• The game is available exclusively on ACC Select at accselect.com and can be watched live and later with on-demand replay with either a Single Event Pass ($3.99 per event) or an All Event Pass ($5.99 per month) which allows unlimited access to games.
Streaks, Storylines & Sidebars ...
• All-America Candidate Tye Jackson will be out indefinitely after suffering a knee injury in UH's overtime exhibition win over the Houston Jaguars last Friday. Jackson had knee surgery Thursday and will be evaluated during the early part of next week as to her potential return.
• Houston has some history on its side heading into a showdown with No. 6/5 Duke Sunday. The Cougars have not opened the season with two-straight losses since 1999-2000. That year, UH dropped three in-a-row to open the campaign, finishing 7-21.
• Houston grabbed the fourth spot in the preseason coaches poll with 99 points, including one first-place vote. Rice was tabbed as the preseason favorite with 142 points and 10 first-place votes. Tulsa and SMU tied for second with 113 points each and the Golden Hurricane received one first-place nod. The poll was voted upon by the league's 12 head coaches and released by the league office Wednesday.
• Houston will once again make a national TV appearance this season with the Jan. 21 game at Rice slotted for an ESPN2 national broadcast. Last season, the Cougars faced Rice on ESPN2 in Hofheinz Pavilion and knocked off the Owls by a 79-72 margin in front of 1,763 fans, the largest home crowd of the season.
• Jackson (17.7 ppg) and Sha'Ratta Hawkins (15.1 ppg) were the only Conference USA teammates last season to average more than 15 points per game.
• UH showed no fear from distance last season, hitting for 5.41 triples per game, ranking second in C-USA. Four players, Kadi Creel, Hawkins, Jackson and Jasmin Moore combined for 142 of UH's 157 triples (.904) and have attempted more threes (487) than 10 of the 11 teams in the league. Only SMU (562) ranked ahead of UH in three-point attempts.
• The Cougars 548 three-point field-goal attempts were the most in school history, eclipsing the mark of the 2001-02 squad that hoisted 533 triples in 34 games.
• Hawkins' 201 individual attempts was also a school record, surpassing Chandi Jones' 168 attempts from 2002-03.
• UH, 6-7 in 13 games at Hofheinz Pavilion last season, averaged 65.8 ppg at home while shooting 39.2 percent (323-825) from the field and 31.5 percent (70-222) from beyond the arc. Away from its home court (4-8), Houston averaged just 58.6 ppg and shot 32.5 percent (242-744) from the field and 61-237 (.257) from three-point land.
A Peek At The Blue Devils ...
• Duke, 2-0 after knocking off Marist 71-50 on Friday night, currently hold down the No. 5 ranking in the lastest USA Today/ESPN Coaches Poll.
• Here's a look at some postgame notes on the Blue Devils, following their second-straight win (Notes courtesy of GoDuke.com).
• After going 1-of-10 shooting in the season opener against Northeastern, senior Alison Bales hit 4-of-5 field goals and scored 10 points in the first half. She finished the game with 12 points, five rebounds and four blocks in only 19 minutes.
• Duke held a 30-10 points in the paint advantage on the night.
• In her second career start, sophomore Carrem Gay notched her first career double-double with 14 points and 10 rebounds in 25 minutes. She hit 6-of-8 field goals on the night.
• Sophomore Abby Waner pulled down a career-high seven rebounds in the contest, while scoring 14 points, dishing out two assists and notching four steals in 27 minutes.
• For the second consecutive game, Duke held its opponents to fewer than 30.0 percent shooting as Marist hit 28.0 percent on Friday.
• Junior Chante Black did not dress in the contest and is questionable for the game on Sunday against Houston.
• The Blue Devils struggled from the free throw line hitting 17-of-30 for the contest.
• All 10 players who played scored for the Blue Devils.
The Ryan's Star On Opening Night...
• Junior Ryan Meyers and Freshman Ryan Bradley led the way for Houston during its opening night loss to Texas Tech.
• Meyers pulled down a game-high 16 rebounds, just two off her career best of 18 and just the second double-digit rebounding game of her career.
• Bradley was the night's leading scorer with 18 points going 8-for-8 from the field, including 2-for-2 from behind the arc.
Onikute Opens With Double Digits...
• Junior Maya Onikute was UH's other scorer in double figures against Tech, pouring in 15 in her Houston debut.
• Onikute played a team-high 36 minutes, accounting for 15 points, seven rebounds, five assists and two steals.
New Faces...
• Houston entered the season with seven new faces as the Cougars added one Division I transfer (Twiggy McIntyre); two players out of high school (Ashlee' Joseph, Ryan Bradley); and four junior college transfers (Whitney James, Sunshine Misa-Uli, Alona Obaze, Maya Onikute). Of the seven, only McIntyre will sit out this season due to NCAA transfer regulations.
• Four of UH's newcomers (James, Joseph, Onikute and Obaze) were in the starting lineup to open the season. The only returnee among the starting five was junior Ryan Meyers.
• With Joseph making the start in the season opener, it marked the second-straight season UH has used a true freshman in its opening night starting five. Last season, Sha'Ratta Hawkins and Nakazi Glover started against Wisconsin. Hawkins responded with 27 points.
Jackson On Wooden Award Watch List...
• Tye Jackson was among 30 players named to the preseason watch list for the prestigious John R. Wooden Women's Award.
• She is one of two Conference USA players to appear on the list, along with Tulsa's Jillian Robbins (Spring, Texas).
• Former UH standout Chandi Jones (2000-04) was a top-16 finalist for the award in 2004.
• Jackson, was a Preseason All C-USA pick as well as a First Team All C-USA selection a year ago. She is the conference's second-leading returning scorer (17.7 ppg) and also dished out 119 assists (5.41 apg) last season.
• The junior finished the campaign with eight 20-plus point games and failed to score in double figures in only two of her 22 starts.
• She scored 30 or more points twice, and her 37-point performance against Rice (Jan. 15) was the top single-game performance in C-USA last season and tied for 15th-best nationally.
Curl Breaks 500 Mark ...
• The season opener against Texas Tech (Nov. 14) marked head coach Joe Curl's 500th game as a head coach.
• Curl, in his ninth season at UH, has tallied 133 wins during his time with the Cougars. He needs 43 wins to eclipse Dot Woodfin as the winningest coach in UH history. Woodfin won 175 games in nine seasons as head coach, from 1976-85.
• Below is a list of active C-USA coaches and their career number of games coached.
