Krista Gerlich wore sparkly boots in Thursday’s win over UTEP. On Monday, she wore a very shimmering gray suit, which seems to be a pattern.
“Just so you know, I don’t sweat,” Gerlich jokingly (kind of) stated. “I sparkle.”
Her coaching sparkled, and so did her team as Texas Tech women’s basketball (20-14) took down the SMU Mustangs 61-49 Monday at the United Supermarkets Arena to advance to the Super 16 of the Women’s National Invitation Tournament (WNIT).
Freshman Bailey Maupin’s 17-point second half and 21 total points were the catalyst in getting Tech the win after they blew 31-20 halftime lead before finding their game once again.
SMU forced five quick turnovers and went on a 13-0 run to start the third quarter.
Gerlich told her team they needed to play hard for the fans, be grateful, and some of them just weren’t doing that in the moment for whatever reason. She said it wasn’t really intentional, but her team wasn’t being purposeful in their play.
Then, midway through the quarter, Tech got an offensive rebound and a heldball from super-senior Katie Ferrell that set up Maupin to draw a foul and bank a short jump shot.
She made the free throw to take the lead back, and combined with six points, three rebounds and two assists in the second half from Bryn Gerlich, they never let go.
“We kind of got away from our game plan [in the third quarter],” Maupin said, “and I feel like that and-one play kind of got us back, snapped us back into our game plan, and we just took care of business from there.”
Maupin credited her teammates for putting her in really good positions to score, and they always tell her and the other underclassmen if they have the opportunity to shoot it, they should shoot it, and that’s what Maupin said she and the team did Monday.
Krista Gerlich said Maupin has also learned how to play really good defense so that she can stay on the floor. She said between the younger players, they have multiple good scorers and Krista Gerlich just figures out who they need to put in.
“I think Bailey definitely had a confidence about her today,” Krista Gerlich said. “She had an explosiveness about her, and towards the end of the game, their best player in my opinion, Jasmine [Smith, who led SMU with 16 points], she had some foul trouble, and she happened to be landing on Bailey every possession, and so we were telling Bailey to go after her to try to get that fifth foul, so I thought Bailey did a great job of continuing to attack the basket.
Super-senior Bre Scott started hot with nine first-quarter points, but finished with just 11 as she couldn’t quite find the basket in the last three quarters.
Her defense and overall intensity still made a huge impact for the Lady Raiders. She finished with seven rebounds and three steals, diving for balls on the court and even losing her shoe on a possession.
“I just wanted to come out and play hard [and] have fun,” Scott said. “Just because I’m not scoring doesn’t mean I can’t play defense and I can’t continue to play hard. It’s not all about scoring, so I didn’t let that get to me. My teammates did a great job as well, so really, I didn’t have to press for it or anything like that.”
The Lady Raiders were 2-for-19 from the three-point line Monday with both makes coming in the first quarter. They were 0-for-5 in the second quarter and 0-for-4 in the first five minutes of the third quarter before slowing down and taking just four threes the last 15 minutes of the game.
They didn’t make any of them, but they continued to drive inside, get the buckets SMU gave them and get to the free-throw line. Tech’s 18-for-20 mark from the free-throw line in the second half led the way to make up for a 28.6% second-half field goal percentage.
“This is the work that we have to put in”
Maupin understands this isn’t the tournament they want to play in, but they want to keep playing for their teammates and the crowds that keep watching them.
“We all understand that there’s steps that you have to go through to get to that tournament, and it’s not something that comes easy,” Maupin said, “and right now, this is the work that we have to put in to get there for next year and the years after that. And our seniors are doing a great job leading that for us.”
Scott, one of those seniors, reiterated that point and talked about the good experience this team is getting and will continue to get.
“In order for us to get to that point with the program, they have to have this type of experience playing in the postseason,” Scott said, “so regardless of whether it’s the NCAA tournament or the WNIT, this is amazing experience for our underclassmen because you’re losing five seniors, and you have sophomores and freshmen and one junior…the longer we can play, the more they’ll be prepared for it next year.”
Krista Gerlich talked about the group of seniors, the mindset that Scott explained and how it’s rare to find that type of thinking.
“You’re not going to find many seniors that are going to talk about playing in this tournament for next year’s team and the good that it’s going to bring for next year’s team when she’s not going to be a part of it,” Krista Gerlich said. “That tells you where our culture is. That tells you how unified this group is. And that tells you what this program is doing and how it’s not about the people that are on the court necessarily.”
On the road the Lady Raiders will go
They didn’t break the 6,478 mark Nebraska set in their second round, but Texas Tech had 4,412 people come watch the second-round game.
Unfortunately for them, the Lady Raiders won’t get to play in the familiar confines of the United Supermarkets Arena in the next round.
They’ll play Arkansas (23-12) at Bud Walton Arena in Fayetteville at 7 p.m. Friday. Arkansas defeated Stephen F. Austin 60-37 in their second-round game Monday.
Krista Gerlich said Arkansas has a tough philosophy to defend as they love to shoot the three-point shot, similar to Big 12 foe Oklahoma.
Super 16, here the Lady Raiders come.
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