Iowa has already beaten 3 teams with an elite center lol.
Agree. Martin’s dependability at the perimeter has taken the place of Warnock, but she is better in the lane. Her paint points plus Stuelke’s efficiency/speed are helping replace Czinano just fine.
We are better defensively by far and I was shocked to find out, rebounding by quite a margin.
As for Martin, she is the poster child of what I have started to see..
My evolution in women’s basketball has been fairly recent, I had one of my daughters and two of my sons all play basketball, and I’ve watched CC play pretty much every game I could in the last two years…(most)
But I wasn’t really aware of several things… I had thought last year’s team was a pretty good rebounding team, a very good offensive team, and very weak at defense…
Much to my surprise, they were pretty much pure raw offense, as the rebounding was a bit of a problem last year, I had forgotten!
They got hot late and played their asses off…
This year I will also admit the first 10 games I didn’t think they were near as good and let’s be honest they weren’t near as good as Big Ten/NCAA tournament Iowa from last year…
But here’s what I didn’t know… Kate Martin is not only a terrific clutch shooter. She is a banging rebounder, and actually has enough handles to take it to the rack!!
MD, hell, I thought she was a potential liability last year and still this year. Holy shit was I wrong about that. She is perfectly capable of running this team without Caitlyn and it still be top 25. No not top 10 but they are still a very good team. She is way quicker than I guessed, way more proficient in the Lane than I would’ve guessed and a pretty, darn good rebounder for her size!!
Stuelke I expected a lot from, and for the most part she’s been well above average, and I’m not even counting the 47 point game from yesterday that was awesome. In fact, if it hadn’t been for injuries and foul trouble, I believe she would be even further along. It will hurt us badly if we can’t keep her in the game over the last couple months of the season.
And Affolter, WOW!!! I’ve been going back and looking at some stats. Does anyone remember she only played 15 minutes versus Virginia Tech but had two points and 14 rebounds and two steals… In 15 minutes!!!
The center play has been a disappointment, but O’Grady who I personally wish had been playing from the start. I know she struggled early, but she’s our best option and I’m happy to see this Edinger get in lately.
So here’s the truth this team is better offensively, we’ve shot more threes and made pretty much the same percentage & our field-goal percentage overall is is still above 50 last year it was 51.7 I think…
We are faster up & down the floor…
We are significantly better on defense…
We are shockingly way better at rebounding…
Every player on this team that plays a role is wildly better than last year’s versions, and without Monica and Warnock, we are a much better defensive and rebounding team, go figure!!
We are better, it may still not be enough, but I wouldn’t trade this team for last years.
We will have major problems if we ever get KM in foul trouble, it doesn’t happen often, but it did vers Ohio State and Hannah both… We are in big trouble!
So yes, we have issues but last year’s team with Monica is not better than this year’s team without…
Would it still be nice to have Monica in “this” team, sure but there’s always trade-offs!!
