THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 14 , 2019. THE WASHINGTON POST EZ M2 D7
BY AVA WALLACE
harrisonburg, va. — The
Maryland women’s basketball
team needed nearly 36 minutes to
warm up on a frigid November
night in their first road game of
the season. But once they got hot,
the Terrapins burned through
James Madison’s 19-point lead in
the fourth quarter to narrowly
escape an upset on the road.
No. 8 Maryland clawed its way
back with a 14-2 run in the final
four minutes of Wednesday’s
game to beat the Dukes, 70-68, a
sigh of relief breathed only when
Kamiah Smalls’s half-court heave
as time ran out clanked off the rim
at James Madison’s Convocation
Center.
Smalls, a senior guard who
helped lead a smooth-operating
Dukes team with 14 points but
turned the ball over twice in the
final three minutes, fell to her
knees and pounded the court
with her fists when the final buzz-
er sounded. James Madison was a
fortuitous bounce away from a
massive upset after controlling
the game nearly until the end.
Things changed late in the
fourth quarter when the Terps
began running their offense
through 6-foot-5 sophomore cen-
ter Shakira Austin. The Dukes
shot better than Maryland for
three quarters, hung with them
on the boards — losing that battle
just 44-38 — and had two fewer
turnovers. But the Terps survived
behind a late-game press and a
half-court defense that found its
footing only in the final quarter.
“I’m crushed,” Dukes Coach
Sean O’Regan said. “I put it all on
me — if we had figured out some-
thing mentality wise, press-break
wise, defensively in the fourth
quarter.... The bottom line is we
didn’t finish.”
Austin led Maryland with
20 points, 17 of which came after
halftime. Freshman point guard
Ashley Owusu had 14 points —
including the decisive layup, curl-
ing around the right side of the
key with three seconds to go —
and sophomore guard Taylor
Mikesell had 10 in another off-
shooting night for the Terps, who
also struggled in Sunday’s loss at
home to South Carolina.
A deep three-pointer from Nik-
ki Oppenheimer to start the
fourth quarter pushed James
Madison’s lead to 60-41. The
Terps, running out of cards to play
at that point, turned to their press
— and it quickly paid dividends,
chipping away at the margin until
a driving layup from Austin got
Maryland within single digits
with 3:37 to play.
Only then did James Madison’s
previously unshakable calm show
some cracks; the Dukes had threeturnovers in the final three min-
utes, which the Terps converted
into points.
“Uncharacteristic, out of
rhythm, first time on the road and
obviously still trying to find our
chemistry,” Maryland Coach
Brenda Frese said. “Proud of the
fourth quarter. We could’ve put
our heads down. We brought a lot
more energy on the defensive
end. I thought Shakira was huge
for us in that fourth quarter when
you talk about the presence that
she made and the team in general,
the plays that we had to make on
the defensive end to get that
back.”
Senior Kaila Charles attributed
the Terps’ slow start to too much
one-on-one play and a lack of
communication on defense.
Maryland was in a 16-point hole
midway through the second quar-
ter.
“We weren’t really bought into
our system in the beginning,”
Charles said.
As in their game against South
Carolina, porous defense trans-
lated into poor shot selection as
the Terps couldn’t find rhythm in
the up-and-down, transition of-
fense in which they usually thrive.
They shot 34.5 percent from the
field before halftime.
The experienced Dukes made
scoring against Maryland look
easy, whizzing by low-post de-
fenders for layups and hitting
jumpers and one-handed bank
shots from wherever they
pleased. The Terps took care of
the basics — they rebounded well
and kept their turnovers relative-
ly in check — but were unable to
establish control.
Even when Maryland dented
the Dukes’ lead, as the Terps did
with a 12-3 run in the second
quarter that looked promising for
a spell, James Madison kept its
nerve.
In the fourth, the Terps finally
used their best mismatch — Aus-
tin — to shift momentum.
“We just came out a lot more
aggressive. It started off with
steals, being able to turn defense
into offense, just slowly just
knowing that you’ve got to at-
tack,” Austin said. “... Go into
their body, stuff we’d been talking
about all game. We were able to
apply it in the fourth quarter,
finally.”
Note: Maryland signed the
No. 2 player in the class of 2020 to
a national letter-of-intent Tues-
day, keeping Frese’s stellar re-
cruiting streak alive.
Baltimore native Angel Reese
is Maryland’s highest-ranked
commit in program history. The
6-3 swing player out of Saint Fran-
ces Academy is the top-ranked
wing in her class and helped lead
her AAU squad, Team Takeover, to
the 2019 EYBL national title.
She averaged 18 points, 20 re-
bounds and five assists in her
junior year.
[email protected]Down 19 in fourth, Terps
storm back to stun JMU
MARYLAND 70,
JAMES MADISON 68extend the temporary injunction
that has allowed him to play the
past two games.
“I’m not going to make any
excuses,” Hardaway said Tuesday
night when asked whether the
drama had weighed on Wiseman
and his team. “I mean, I think it’s
been obviously a tough week for
the 18-year-old, but we were
ready to play. We understand
what was going on.”
In May, after he hauled in the
nation’s top recruiting class,
Hardaway conjured some of his
old all-star bravado and declared
his team ready for all
competition by saying famously,
“This is Memphis. We don’t bluff.
We want all the smoke.”
Is it smoky enough yet, Penny?
The situation is messy and
complex, but here’s the short
version: The NCAA cleared
Wiseman — the potential No. 1
pick in the 2020 NBA draft — to
play, then changed its mind.
When he was a high school
coach, Hardaway is alleged to
have paid $11,500 to the
Wiseman family — unbeknown
to the player — to assist with a
move from Nashville to
Memphis. It’s further
complicated because, in 2008,
Hardaway made a $1 million
donation to Memphis, his alma
mater. From that point, the
NCAA considered him a booster.
It seems the NCAA wants to
connect too many dots with
Hardaway, who went from
superstar alum to generous
supporter to unexpected prep
coach to unlikely college coach
in a decade. It wasn’t some
orchestrated plan to take over
the program and get Wiseman,
BREWER FROM D1
who was 7 back in 2008.
However, Hardaway appears
guilty of being a high school
coach who wanted to stack his
team, but he will argue that he
has a long history, even before
coaching, of using portions of his
NBA millions to help hundreds
of people for various reasons.
The least painful solution, for
all parties, would be something
of a compromise. There’s no case
quite like this, but if there’s a
paper trail of Hardaway paying
for that $11,500 moving expense,
it’s an impermissible benefit.
Typically, the NCAA would
require Wiseman to repay that
money and serve, say, a six-game
suspension before his eligibilityis restored. But Memphis is
upset because, until now, it had
cooperated with the NCAA and it
is accusing the organization of
arbitrarily coming after the
program without any new proof
of wrongdoing.
It’s a squabble that could ruin
an interesting season of parity
before it really begins. By getting
an injunction, Memphis already
has violated a clear NCAA bylaw
and could end up making itself
ineligible for tournament play if
it doesn’t win this case. On the
other hand, Memphis seemingly
has everyone in its diverse and
fascinating city behind it, from
hardscrabble citizens to wealthy
supporters to just about everypolitician tied to the area.
In addition, the NCAA is
considered so unpopular and
ineffectual right now that it can’t
win with the public, even if it has
a point. The reaction on social
media, from superstars such as
LeBron James to anonymous
posters, is overwhelmingly
supportive of the Tigers standing
up to a hypocritical organization
in desperate need of reinvention.
Before the game, two NBA scouts
told me, in separate
conversations, that they were
rooting for Wiseman to give the
NCAA headaches.
The NCAA — which has power
only because the universities
choose to let it have power — isstruggling to remain relevant
during what could be a time of
revolution in college athletics.
We’re not there yet, but the fight
is building, and Memphis’s
defiance only takes us closer to
this moment of conflict. NCAA
President Mark Emmert is right
to worry about an existential
threat to his institution. But
survival shouldn’t involve merely
protecting the lucrative status
quo. The real threat is the
NCAA’s reluctance to evolve.
That’s where it has lost respect.
That’s where it often seems like a
bunch of mall cops in over their
heads.
So en route to hell, how about
a shocker, NCAA? Settle with
Memphis. See the big picture.
Give a little. Punish without
destroying; Wiseman and the
Tigers would surely accept a
moderate suspension over the
unknown. Move on. And move
quickly so that court hearings
don’t define this season.
Sometimes the most
authoritative act is to provide
swift and reasonable resolution.
Two weeks ago, in its
noncommittal and ambiguous
statement pledging to look
further into compensating
players for their name, image
and likeness, the NCAA kept
echoing the word
“modernization.” That should be
the standard for every revision it
makes. But you get the feeling
that it’s just a buzzword and not
a mission statement.
It was funny, watching
Memphis as a guest of honor at
the Phil Knight Invitational. Bad
booster, entertain good booster.
All hail Nike for its assistance in
making college basketball a
multibillion-dollar mess. Butshame on Memphis, a Nike
school, for getting caught in this
sticky web of money and
exploitation.
Near the end of the game, a
couple of fans attempted an
uninspired heckling. “Wiseman,
you need some money?” they
asked. Their words were faint,
not contagious. A few minutes
later, Wiseman — perhaps the
best player in college basketball
for as long as litigation allows —
walked off the court with the
rest of his precocious
teammates.
“There are no losses,”
Hardaway said afterward.
“There’s learns. There’s wins and
learns. I promise you, we will get
better from it.”
Despite Hardaway’s optimism,
he cannot be certain that only
progress will come from the
current drama.
Throughout Moda Center,
electronic Nike signs read: Sport
Changes Everything.
There should have been an
asterisk, followed by the words
“Except the NCAA.”
While Memphis doesn’t
qualify as completely innocent in
this saga, it also shouldn’t be the
target of capricious discipline
from a graying establishment
anxious about its diminishing
importance. The NCAA probably
feels it needs a win. But more
than anything, it needs to
redefine what it considers
success. The objective should be
evolution. Right now, the NCAA
is undermining its interests —
and its potential for a future —
with obdurate leadership.
[email protected]For more by Jerry Brewer, visit
washingtonpost.com/brewer.JERRY BREWER
Wiseman case could push NCAA to modernize — or it could take Memphis down
CRAIG MITCHELLDYER/ASSOCIATED PRESS
Coach Penny Hardaway is one of Memphis’s all-time star players. James Wiseman could be the next.JOE ROBBINS/GETTY IMAGESOhio State’s Duane Washington Jr. helped hold Villanova to 51 points and scored 14 of his own to lead the Buckeyes’ balanced offense.
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Duane Washington Jr. had
14 points and four other players
scored in double figures as No. 16
Ohio State started hot and ran
over No. 10 Villanova, 76-51, on
Wednesday night in Columbus,
Ohio.
Washington opened the game
with a pair of three-pointers to
set the tone, and the Buckeyes
moved to 3-0 with a significant
early-season victory.
D.J. Carton and Luther Mu-
hammad each had 11 points, and
CJ Walker and Kaleb Wesson
added 10 apiece.
Jermaine Samuels had
14 points and Cole Swider had 11
for the Wildcats (1-1), who shot
poorly out of the gate and man-
aged just 30.6 percent for the
game. They were held to a dozen
points in the first 16 minutes.
The Buckeyes came out firing,
bolted to a 19-3 lead, held a 40-22
advantage at halftime and led by
as many as 30 in this Gavitt
Tipoff Game, a November series
that matches up the Big Ten and
the Big East.
Villanova was stunned by the
Buckeyes’ start and didn’t show
signs of life until a 9-0 run late in
the first half. Kyle Young started
the second half with a dunk, and
the Buckeyes never backed off
the gas.
LOUISVILLE 91, INDIANA
STATE 62: Jordan Nwora scored
21 points, Dwayne Sutton added
14, and the No. 4 Cardinals shot
59 percent from the field to run
past the Sycamores in Louisville.
Two days after moving up a
spot in the top 25, the Cardinals
(3-0) made 14 of their first
17 shots for a 16-point lead
through 11 minutes on the way to
a 47-26 advantage at the break.
Tyreke Key led Indiana State
(0-2) with 20 points, including
four three-pointers. Two of his
threes came during a 14-2 run
early in the second half that got
the Sycamores within 51-40.
TEXAS TECH 103, HOUS-
TON BAPTIST 74: Freshman
Jahmius Ramsey scored
25 points on 10-for-13 shooting,
TJ Holyfield had 21 points on
9-for-10 shooting, and the No. 11
Red Raiders handled the Huskies
in Midland, Tex.
Texas Tech (3-0) had four play-
ers score in double figures while
shooting 60 percent overall from
the field (40 for 67). Kyler Ed-
wards had 13 points with three
three-pointers, and DavideMoretti scored 12 points and had
six assists.
Jalon Gates had 21 points with
five three-pointers to lead Hous-
ton Baptist (0-3). Ian DuBose
added 20 points.
The neutral-site game was
played at Midland College’s
Chaparral Center, about
120 miles from the Red Raiders’
campus in Lubbock. It was their
first regular season game in the
Permian Basin since 1951.Ionescu leads Oregon women
Sabrina Ionescu surpassed
2,000 career points and fell just
short of a 19th triple-double as
No. 1 Oregon routed Utah State,
109-52, in Eugene, Ore.
Ioenscu became the fourth
Oregon player to reach the
2,000-point plateau. She had a
scary moment in the third quar-
ter when she was fouled driving
to the basket and fell to the court,
putting a hand on the back of her
right leg.
She was helped to her feet and
appeared to be reluctant to go to
the bench. She sat out the final
few minutes of the period before
returning to start the fourth
quarter.
The preseason all-American
finished with 16 points, 12 assists
and nine rebounds.
Sophomore Taylor Chavez ledthe Ducks (2-0) with a career-
high 25 points, and senior Ruthy
Hebard added 19 points and
15 rebounds for her 41st career
double-double.
Steph Gorman led the Aggies
(1-2) with 13 points.
CONNECTICUT 64, VAN-
DERBILT 51: Megan Walker
scored 25 points, and the fourth-
ranked Huskies beat the Commo-
dores in Nashville.
The Huskies (2-0) have won
six straight against Vanderbilt
(2-1) after dropping the first two
between these programs.
U-Conn. hadn’t played at Van-
derbilt’s Memorial Gym since
March 1992, when the Commo-
dores ended the Huskies’ run in
the second round of the NCAA
tournament a year after the first
of Connecticut’s record 20 Final
Four berths.
SOUTH CAROLINA 75,
DAYTON 49: Freshman Zia
Cooke scored 27 points, and the
No. 6 Gamecocks (3-0) followed
up their win at Maryland on
Sunday by dominating the Flyers
(2-1) in Dayton, Ohio.
Cooke, one of the nation’s top
prep point guards out of nearby
Toledo, went 5 for 6 from beyond
the arc and had seven rebounds.
Jenna Giacone scored 18 for
Dayton, which shot only 22 per-
cent from the field.NATIONAL COLLEGE BASKETBALL ROUNDUP
Buckeyes ride hot start to easy win over Wildcats
OHIO STATE 76,
VILLANOVA 51