The University of Alabama at Birmingham Athletics
UAB
Rice
UAB Women's Basketball Edges Rice in Overtime
1/8/2017 12:00:00 AM | Women's Basketball
Score: UAB 61 , Rice 61 (OT) Final Box (PDF)
Records: UAB (8-6, 1-2 C-USA), Rice (9-6, 0-4 C-USA)
Location: Birmingham, Ala. at Bartow Arena (8,500)
Series Record: UAB 8-5; Norton improves to 3-1; At Bartow: UAB leads 4-2
UAB Highlights
BIRMINGHAM, Ala. – The UAB women’s basketball team edged Rice 62-61 in overtime for its first Conference USA win of the season. Rachael Childress paced the Blazers’ offense with a career-high 18 points in the win.
HOW IT HAPPENED
- In a tightly contested contest, the Blazers trailed 43-38 heading into the fourth quarter. UAB outscored Rice 12-7 to erase the defict to force its second overtime in as many games.
- In overtime, the Owls took an early 52-50 lead, but a 8-0 UAB run gave the Blazers a 6-point lead, 58-52, with a minute to play. Rice’s Jasmine Goodwin, who ended the night with 28 points, sunk a triple to cut UAB’s lead to three 58-55, but free throws by Miyah Barnes and Deanna Kuzmanic put the Blazers up five with 30 seconds remaining. Another long ball trimmed UAB’s lead, but Childress put the game out of reach on a pair of free throws with seven seconds to go, earning UAB the win.
- UAB opened the game with an early 8-2 lead, however, poor shooting by both teams allowed the Blazers to lead 13-10 after the opening 10.
- The second quarter the Owls outscored the Blazers 18-13, earning Rice a 28-26 lead at the break.
- The third quarter saw Rice’s largest lead, seven, at 41-34 with 3:15 to go, however, UAB outscored Rice 16-9 to close out the game to force overtime.
UAB HIGHLIGHTS
- Freshman Rachael Childress paced the UAB offense with 18 points, a career-high. Childress has led the Blazers in scoring four times this season; she netted a career-high five triples
- Senior Janeka Williams made her first start of the season and 28th of her career; Williams attempted a season high eight field goals
- Three Blazers reeled in seven rebounds to lead UAB (Keonna Farmer, Kara Rawls and Deanna Kuzmanic)
- Junior Keonna Farmer’s three blocks ties a career high; Farmer’s recorded seven boards and has led the Blazers in rebounding 11 times this season, including the last 10 games
- Sophomore Deanna Kuzmanic netted 10 points; she has scored in double figures eight times this season and 19 times in her career
- Kuzmanic recorded a season-best seven rebounds and has led the team in rebounding in back-to-back games
- Sophomore Deanna Kuzmanic recorded a season high in blocks (1), and played a season-best 40 minutes
- Freshman Imani Johnson tied her career high in steals (1)
- Freshman Miyah Barnes led the team in assists for the sixth time this season
- Junior Whytney Singleton made her first appearance since December 3, 2016; she netted nine points in her return
- Sophomore Deanna Kuzmanic made her 45th consecutive start, the longest active streak on the team
- Junior Keonna Farmer made her 14th consecutive start, the longest streak of her career
TEAM NOTES
- UAB moves to 8-6 this season and 1-2 in C-USA play
- Head coach Randy Norton improves to 57-50 and 26-29 in conference play
- Head Coach Randy Norton improves to 3-5 in overtime games
- UAB debuted its fourth starting lineup of the season; Miyah Barnes, Deanna Kuzmanic, Janeka Williams, Rachael Childress, and Keonna Farmer (1-0)
- UAB swatted a season-high eight blocks
- UAB is 1-1 in games that go to overtime this season, and 1-1 in games decided by one point
- UAB played back-to-back overtime games for the first time since February 5 (W, 94-91 at Florida Atlantic) and February 8 (L, 83-73 against East Carolina)
- UAB has played back-to-back overtime games five times in program history
- The Blazer bench outscored Rice’s bench 18-5; UAB is 7-4 this season when outscoring its opponents bench
- UAB’s 12 points in overtime is a season-high
- UAB held Rice to a season-low seven points in the fourth quarter
BREAKING DOWN THE BOX SCORE
- UAB had a pair of players score in double figures: Rachael Childress (18), Deanna Kuzmanic (10)
- For the second-straight game, Deanna Kuzmanic led the Blazers in rebounds (7)
- Rice out-rebounded UAB 49-40; 21 of which were offensive rebounds
- UAB and Rice each scoed 18 points in the paint, eight points off turnovers, and two fast-break buckets; Rice led in second-chance points 17-12, while UAB’s bench out-produced Rice’s 18-5
- Rice’s Jasmine Goodwine tallied 28 points and reeled in 10 boards; Shani Rainey also notched a double-double with 11 points and 11 boards
- UAB swatted away six blocks, a season-high
- In the tightly contested matchup there were six lead changes and the game was tied four times
QUOTABLE
Head Coach Randy Norton
Opening Statement…
As I told our team I’m really really proud of them. Things weren’t perfect today, we had to grind it out. This whole week started with Middle Tennessee then the North Texas game we came out and got off to a really slow start, were down 15 in the fourth quarter and then come back and take the lead, that takes a lot of energy to do that and a lot of emotion. Now we come back today, we were off yesterday and you could kind of see that, but we just grinded it out and found a way to win. We had some players hit clutch shots, we had some clutch free throws. On a day where the ball wasn’t going in, we found a way to win. Anybody that watches sports knows that you have to find a way to win and I think we did that today.
On winning an overtime game…
You look at our week where we lost by three to Middle Tennessee, lose by one in overtime, and then win today in overtime, you talk about preparing for the conference tournament. We would have liked to win all three of those, but as far as the big picture we couldn’t drop a better scenario to put our kids in and for them to have to learn how to win. Today they found out to win and they saw that they could win by digging in and playing defense. We held this team under their average. Offensively we’re not getting the assists like we need to, I thought we took care of the ball, but I feel like we’re not making the extra pass like we did earlier in the year. We have to get back to making what we call the ‘One more’ and if we can get back to that then we’re going to score and I’m confident that our team will start hitting free throws because that will make a huge difference as well.
On having Whytney Singleton back…
It’s huge. Whytney knows how I feel about her, she’s a special player and has as high of a basketball IQ of anyone that I’ve coached in all of my years. She understands the game and she understands me, I don’t even have to say much to her because we think alike. She provides great leadership on the floor for us, she’s a clutch player, and without a doubt I think if we had of had Whytney a couple of the other games we win those games. She helps us win close games with her leadership.
On preparing the team for their first conference road games…
Just the same thing that we’ve talked about all year- focus on the things we can control. That’s our preparation as we get ready to go on the road and it’s paying attention to details. Every day we come to practice our goal is to get better. We’ll lace them up and take on Western Kentucky, who we all know is picked to win the league, an outstanding team. We’ve played them tough the last couple of years and we’ll go up and mix it up with them then see what happens.
Whytney Singleton | Junior | Guard
On how it felt to be back out there…
It was everything I imagined. I was excited, overwhelmed, it was great.
On the team win…
It’s like what I just told coach, I couldn’t even focus on the stats because I was so happy about the win. We could not have a home stand here and go 0-3, we had to get a win. The win is everything for me, but right now we have to focus on one game at a time. This win was exactly what we needed, especially since we’re going on the road now.
On working with Miyah Barnes …
It’s fun, Miyah makes my job very easy. I can give it to her, she can give it to me. It’s a learning experience too, because she may tell me something and then I can tell her things back. It’s fun to play with a person who you know is just as good as you and is going to get better in the future.
On what you tell the team about moving on and going on the road…
Basically, we have to do what we do because it’s going to get hectic. Coach does a good job of trying to put us in different situations in practice. At the end of the day it’s still a basketball game and we just have to focus on putting the ball in the hole and doing what we do and playing UAB basketball.
UP NEXT
UAB hits the road for its first C-USA road trip as it travels to Preseason No. 1 Western Kentucky on Thursday before heading to Marshall on Saturday, January 14.
For more information on UAB women’s basketball, follow the Blazers on Twitter (@UAB_WBB), Instagram (@UAB_WBBALL)
