The Maryland women’s basketball team entered halftime with a 20-point lead Thursday against Illinois. The Illini scored eight points in the second frame and never made it to the foul line.
While Illinois found more offensive success after the break — Maryland had a five-point advantage in the final two frames — the abysmal opening quarters kept the team from ever pulling close to upsetting the No. 3 Terps.
Guard Shatori Walker-Kimbrough scored a season-high 29 points, helping Maryland to an 84-59 win.
“In the second quarter you saw us get [to] where we can kind of separate as a team,” coach Brenda Frese said. “We were able to hold them scoreless for that last five and a half [minutes] of the second quarter.”
Maryland closed the first quarter strongly, putting the Illinois defense into a whirlwind of ball movement, skipping it around the perimeter, making entry passes to center Brionna Jones and receiving quick kick-outs from the senior soon after.
“Sometimes early I thought we were trying to make it harder than it needed to be,” Frese said. “Once we kind of figured out to settle in, I thought we did a terrific job in terms of sharing the basketball.”
In the final two possessions of the first quarter, that passing resulted in open looks from three-point range for guards Destiny Slocum and Shatori Walker-Kimbrough, and both converted to give Maryland a 26-12 lead.
The end of the second quarter held an even harsher fate as the Illini didn’t score a point over the final five minutes and 33 seconds.
“For us to have a chance, we had to finish the first half better,” said Illinois coach Matt Bollant. “To me, that was the difference.”
After Illini guard Jaelyne Kirkpatrick and forward Ali Andrews opened scoring in the second quarter with 3-pointers, cutting the Terps’ lead to eight points, Maryland closed the half on a 14-2 run. Illinois shot 3-for-13 in the second quarter and 26.7 percent in the first half.
“Give [Maryland] a lot of credit for it,” Bollant said of his team’s offensive struggles. “We didn’t get any kind of rhythm going because they defend so well.”
Frese said seeing her team’s defense lock down and spark a run was refreshing after her nation-leading offense has controlled recent games.
Walker-Kimbrough paced the Terps before intermission with 15 points, including an and-one layup from a tight angle under the basket during the 10-0 run to close the half. She finished with 29 points on 10-for-19 shooting and 6-for-12 from three-point range.
“We noticed that when [center Brionna Jones] was getting the ball inside, they were sending two and three and four people at her,” Walker-Kimbrough said. “That just left open shots for us.”
Illinois slowed play and drained the shot clock in the third period to notch 17 points, including 2 of 4 three-pointers, to Maryland’s 20 in the period. Bollant said that was a conscious effort to decrease possessions after Maryland blew out the Illini, 94-49, in a fast-paced game Jan. 26.
The strategy worked, and Maryland’s offense struggled some to match Illinois’ 33.3 shooting percentage in the third quarter.
Walker-Kimbrough stayed hot, though, with the help of Slocum’s passing. The freshman finished with 13 assists — a total Frese said she’d never seen from a point guard— and assisted on 16 of Walker-Kimbrough’s points.
“We didn’t do a good job of finding Walker-Kimbrough, and she got going,” Bollant said. “She had way too many open looks. They had 25 assists, and they share the basketball … so well.”
Illinois scored more points in the fourth quarter (22) than it did in the first half (20), but it wasn’t enough given the Illini’s futility in the latter portions of the first half.
“You can typically find for us where that separation falls,” Frese said. “We were able to really dominate in that stretch, both ends of the floor in terms of what we were doing.”
