Three Takeaways From IUWBB's Season-Opening 96-43 Victory Over Eastern Illinois
Three Takeaways From IUWBB's Season-Opening 96-43 Victory Over Eastern Illinois
The Indiana Women's Basketball team opened their regular season slate with a blowout victory over EIU.
Hello everybody!
Before we get started, I want to introduce myself to the community.
I am Josh Pos, a sophomore from the suburbs of Chicago. I am studying sports media at IU under the guidance of
.Some of you may remember me from my baseball/softball updates in the Mighty Networks community, and I am very excited for the opportunity to share my insight on the women’s basketball team with the community this season!
Okay let’s get into it!
Here are my three takeaways from Indiana’s 96-43 victory in their regular season opener vs Eastern Illinois.
400 For Moren
The gameday routine was the same as it had been her entire career.
Indiana Women’s Basketball head coach Teri Moren started her day with a workout on her Versa bike with a couple members of her staff. Then she spent time with her team at shootaround.
Moren found out yesterday she was entering the 2023-2024 season with 399 career victories and that neither her staff nor her family said anything about reaching the milestone prior to the game.
“They know better, right?” Moren said with a smile. “Those are not things that I pay attention to.”
In the most Teri Moren way possible, she did not believe her team played very well despite the 55-point victory. She specifically noted the Hoosiers shooting just 2-11 from the charity stripe.
“When they congratulated me on my 400th win, I said we're gonna shoot 400 free throws tomorrow.”
Mackenzie Holmes is REALLY Good
This may be an understatement.
Indiana’s senior leader racked up 19 points, six rebounds, and four blocks in just 18 minutes of play. She was in midseason form in the first half of the season opener, bringing the 8,380 in Simon Skjodt Assembly Hall to their feet multiple times throughout the night.
In the second quarter, Holmes passed Karna Abram as the third-highest scorer in program history. She is now just two points shy of Denise Jackson in the second spot.
“She’s an all-American,” Yarden Garzon said of the 5th year senior. “It’s really fun playing with an all-American.”
Holmes shot 9/10 from the field tonight. So if you count last week’s exhibition game, she is shooting 23-24 on the season.
Is shooting 96% from the field sustainable? Probably not, but Mackenzie Holmes is on pace to break a lot of records this season.
Shtayim Garzon
If you went to Assembly Hall for a Women’s Basketball game last season, then you heard public address announcer Jeremy Gray say the words “Shelosh Garzon,” which roughly translates to “Garzon for three.”
Over the summer, Garzon worked on being more aggressive with the ball and scoring more in the paint. Well, the sophomore from Ra’anana, Israel scored 15 points tonight, none of which came from beyond the arc.
Garzon now has the ability to keep defensive players honest by being able to drive to the basket and either score and/or find an open teammate for an assist, of which she had seven last night. That’s an important development for an IU team that will be adjusting to not having the versatile offensive presence of Grace Berger.
The Hoosiers will travel to Palo Alto, California on Sunday to take on the 15th-ranked Stanford Cardinal at 5 P.M. on ESPN.
Our Doing The Work crew of
and will host a postgame show immediately following the game.
Nice work josh!!
Great report @Josh Pos. Teri is taking my wife’s advice to make today’s practice about free throws. 😂