The roster has some new faces, of course, but two games into this season, the University of Richmond women’s basketball squad that won the 2024 Atlantic 10 championship back in March is already looking like a program prepped to make noise for a second-straight year in the conference.
On the same day in which UR’s 2024 A-10 regular season and tournament championship banners were unveiled in the Robins Center, the Spiders were in the driver’s seat the entire way, en route to a 93-39 victory over Morgan State University on Nov. 9.
“I thought a fantastic outing for our entire program, entire team today,” UR Head Coach Aaron Roussell said during the postgame press conference. “I think what you saw today was the depth that this group has.”
Even with a second-straight slow outing offensive production-wise for junior forward Maggie Doogan, the Spiders found a way to soar past the Lady Bears by 54 points. Doogan finished with just four points in the effort.
“I thought [Doogan] played great today,” Rousell said. “I think this is another one of those, we went through this growth with Addie last year, that you can have two points and play really well. You can have four points and dominate a game. Look at how we played today, and I say this as a compliment, between Maggie and Addie we were 3-of-13, like great. I think that shows the depth.”
The Spiders began the game on a 10-0 run, and unlike in their season opener win against Temple University Nov. 4, continued to create separation all throughout gameplay. By the end of the first quarter, the Spiders had already left Morgan State with a 23-point deficit.
And their efforts did not stop there. An onslaught of offense from the Spiders coupled with a strong defensive showing made it so the Lady Bears did not score more than 11 points in any of the four quarters of the game. In fact, the fourth quarter saw Morgan State score just six points.
The Spiders’ first unit set the tone, but it was their second unit that ultimately served as the knockout punch. Graduate forward Anna Camden and junior forward Sam Dewey led the way in the box score with 15 points, while graduate guard Alyssa Jimenez and first-year guard Alicia Newell were not far behind with 13 and nine points, respectively.
UR tallied 57 bench points compared to Morgan State’s 15, and while the Spiders did have 17 turnovers, they were able to capitalize off of the Lady Bears’ 24 turnovers, scoring 31 of their 93 points off of those Morgan State miscues.
“Second unit, I mean we kind of just watched that first unit go,” Dewey said in the postgame press conference. “We watched them pretty closely on the bench, kind of do what they do, go in and do our jobs and be solid and score.”
With the exception of the third quarter, where the Spiders shot 41.18% from the field coming out of the halftime break, UR shot over 50% in each quarter against Morgan State, making for almost a 60% overall shooting clip on the day.
The Spiders will take on Fairfield University away at 7 p.m. Nov. 12 as they look to continue their undefeated start to the season.
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“What we have and the way that we’re playing right now, I do like where this team can go,” Rousell said. “I probably felt that about that group last year around this time, but that group ended up getting it done. So I like where we are right now. We got a far cry from where that group ended up, but I think there’s a really, really high ceiling with this group here.”
Contact sports editor Jimmy James at jimmy.james@richmond.edu.
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