In a rare trip for myself, I went to see the women's team take on the UMBC retrievers across town in Baltimore.  Good game, UMBC appeared to be in it until about 8 minutes left in the second half, when the Hounds took a lead they would not let go of.  The result was a twenty point Greyhound win, no real letdown after the good U of MD win.

BAD:
FIRST HALF DEFENSE:  Not overall.  It just seemed that in the last 10 seconds of the shot clock, while on defense, the Hounds took it for granted.  They relaxed.  The first 20 seconds of defense would be superb, but somehow UMBC would find a shot in the last 10 that wasn't just a desperation heave.

INABILITY TO PUT THEM AWAY:  A few times in the second half, the Greyhounds had the chance to close the deal and simply didn't.  They'd have UMBC on the ropes, ready to go down, and didn't deliver that knock-out punch.  In all fairness, however, the refs were horrible.  Terrible calls both ways.  It's sad that they can have such an impact on the game.

GOOD:
MARY ANNE KIRSCH:  Break out game for Kirsch.  She had 19 pts, 8 boards, and no turnovers in 28 minutes.  She was only 9-14 from the line, though.  She was very impressive down low, scoring and rebounding at will.

COREY HEWITT & SHANNON COHEN:  Both play great defense, and Corey was a star tonight passing the ball with 5 assists, one of them a highlight reel pass (if it was SportsCenter).  Cohen defensively is more advanced than a lot of other players at this level that I've seen, she really gets after people.

FIELD GOAL %, BOTH WAYS:  The Hounds shot 48.2% for the game, not too bad.  It'll get better as the season wears on.  They also were able to keep the Retrievers at just 42%, reminiscent of last year's great defensive play.

OVERALL:
Hard game to judge.  The fact that they could have put them away but didn't until late makes me a little nervous.  However, it seems like a solid "B+" is a good grade for this game.  Should be interesting to see how they do on this road trip - Hounds don't have another game at home until December 29th.

STATS: