The DePaul women’s basketball team kicked off their Big East play with an impressive 66-43 win against Butler on Dec. 21. This is the third game this season where DePaul has beaten a team by 20 points or more. Butler came into this game with a 10-3 record.
In the first quarter, DePaul limited Butler to 15 points, making this the fourth time this season DePaul has held an opponent to 15 points or less in the first quarter.
Butler also had 15 turnovers, leading DePaul to 11 points off turnovers.
DePaul’s leading scorer was junior guard Taylor Johnson-Matthews with 22 points — her highest scoring game this season. Johnson-Matthews said she is finding her spots and her teammates are finding her.
“They know where my spots are,” Johnson-Matthews said. “The biggest shoutout is to my teammates.”
Alongside Johnson-Matthew’s high scoring was junior forward Meg Newman and graduate forward Jorie Allen, who both had 12 points.
Even though Allen had 12 points, she was only 4 of 18 from the field. For the season, she has made 45.2% of her field goals, but last night she made 22.2%.
“Even when I’m struggling, (my teammates) have my back,” Allen said. “I love that this team is not just me. It may look like that on the stats sheet, but it’s never been just me. … Today showed how much we’ve learned over the past couple of months.”
Sophomore guard Grace Carstensen has been playing more minutes and trying to find her shot. She found it last tonight, with three three-pointers — the most on the team.
Interim head coach Jill Pizzotti said when other players start to develop their shot, then the Blue Demons will play their best basketball.
“As these players gain experience and start to feel a little more comfortable and start to figure out where they best score, that combined with Jorie is going to make us a better basketball team,” Pizzotti said. “We want to be able to have balanced scoring across the board.”
The Blue Demons were strong with their rebounding. They got 43 rebounds in total — 28 of those were defensive rebounds. Half of those defensive rebounds were secured by three players: redshirt sophomore guard Haley Walker, sophomore guard Shakara McCline and Newman. DePaul’s 15 offensive rebounds led to 11 second chance points.
“Rebounding is the key to winning every basketball game,” Pizzotti said. “Once we establish the lead, we want to stay aggressive on offense and take care of the basketball, but then you just have to defend and rebound and stay clean.”
Butler made only 32.7% of their field goals, which was the lowest percentage they have shot this season.
In the second half, Butler made zero three-pointers. They were 3 of 19 (15.8%) in attempted three-point shots, compared to DePaul’s 6 of 15 (40%).
“(Butler shoots) the ball well, and several of them shoot threes,” Pizzotti said. “In the fourth quarter, we made a little bit of a defensive adjustment because we didn’t want them getting open shots. I think we had good closeouts. As we say, we’re trying to make them miss, even just by an inch.”
Butler also only made 8.3% of their field goals in the third quarter. The Blue Demons held Butler to five points in the quarter — the lowest scoring quarter a DePaul opponent has had this season.
“We’re ready and we’re coming for the Big East,” Allen said. “It’s wide open and we want it.”
The next DePaul women’s basketball game is Sunday, Dec. 29 at 2 p.m. at Wintrust Arena against Marquette.
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