What we learned from Feast Week in women’s college basketball

• Women's College Basketball

Feast Week is over in women’s college basketball and we learned a lot about Texas, North Carolina, and Audi Crooks.

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RICHMOND, VA. — A week ago, Richmond and Navy played in an entertaining game at the Spiders’ home inside the Robins Center that featured both teams grappling with their strengths and weaknesses. The Midshipmen led midway through the third quarter, and then the Spiders pulled away in the final frame for a decisive double-digit victory.

It was a contest featuring a pair of mid-major teams who both have their sights set on bigger things this season. After getting an at-large bid to the NCAA Tournament — and winning a game in it — last season, Aaron Roussell’s Richmond squad aims to dance in March again. And Navy, after struggling for a few seasons amidst a pandemic, a rebuild, and hurdles unique to Service Academies, finally have their best team under Tim Taylor. The Midshipmen were voted as preseason favorites in the Patriot League and see making the Big Dance as an achievable goal.

Both teams learned about themselves in the matchup. Specifically, they found out how competitive they could be when their respective stars — Richmond’s Maggie Doogan and Navy’s Zanai Barnett-Gay — don’t have their best offensive performances. Doogan shot just 1-of-8 from the floor and had two points in the first half, then got on track and shot 5-of-11 in the second half to finish with a double-double. Barnett-Gay played great defensively, but finished with just 11 points on 4-of-13 shooting.

Despite getting the win, Roussell thought Navy exposed his Spiders in certain aspects of the game.

And that’s what he was counting on when he agreed to put the Mids on his schedule.

“I thought their gameplan was solid. I have so much respect for them and their staff. You go through the gauntlet of, how many different things could they do? What are they going to do? … They’re going to do something, they’re going to guard us well, which I thought they did. They did a good job on Maggie today,” Roussell said. “I thought inside, they did a really good job offensively of exposing us. It’s good to be tested… You want to go find some good coaches that are going to find some holes in you early in the season and expose you down the road.”

Roussell added that he thought Navy uncovered some shortcomings in the Spiders’ post defense. And indeed, the Mids scored 26 points in the paint and had 12 second-chance points on 13 offensive rebounds. On the flipside, Roussell was pleased with the way his perimeter defense held up, holding Navy to 3-of-21 from behind the arc.

Likewise, Taylor knew Richmond was going to be a challenging opponent and put some of the Mids’ mistakes on film to give them something to work on before conference play begins. Ahead of this matchup, Taylor called Richmond the best team Navy would face all season, which is noteworthy because the Mids already beat an SEC team in Florida by double figures.

“They’re an extremely hard matchup because they’re so long and you got five people on the floor at all times that can shoot the 3. Richmond is a top 30 team,” Taylor told SB Nation. “The two things that I come away with is, we got to control the defensive boards. We gave up 18 offensive rebounds and you can’t do that. And our defensive coverage got stretched in the fourth quarter.

“We have to be able to learn these things. This environment was great for us… I feel good about where we can be and where we can go, because I know this team can get better and better.”

Fast forward to this past weekend and it wasn’t hard to see Richmond and Navy attempting to correct some of those deficiencies against their Feast Week opponents.

After losing to TCU, Richmond played one of its best defensive games against Green Bay — another team that made the NCAA Tournament last season. The Spiders held the Phoenix to 5-of-20 from 3-point land, out-rebounded them by nine and held Green Bay to just four fast break points.

In a win over Manhattan, Navy held the Jaspers to 19 percent shooting from behind the arc and forced them into 23 turnovers. And while the Mids lost a nail-biter to Duquesne in overtime, they saw a potential Robin emerge to Barnett-Gay’s Batman, as Julianna Almeida tallied 14 points, a career-best 12 rebounds and three assists. The Dukes did grab 22 offensive rebounds, giving Taylor and his coaching staff a real problem they have to zero in on and solve in December.

This is largely what Feast Week is all about: Teams matching up against challenging opponents, finding out where they measure up and finding out what they need to fix before conference play begins in earnest.

Richmond and Navy both learned a lot in November. Here’s what else we can take away from a revealing week of women’s college basketball…

Texas is legit, again

A lot of folks had concerns about Texas’ ability to get back to the Final Four this season, painting last year as a lightning-in-a-bottle run where the Longhorns took advantage of a favorable March Madness draw and some bracket luck. Could Madison Booker and Rori Harmon be even better? Could Jordan Lee step up in the role of a full-time starter? Could the shoes of Taylor Jones and Shay Holle be filled?

The answers to all of those questions, it seems now, is a resounding yes.

Texas owns two of the most impressive wins by any team this season and pulled them off in back-to-back nights, handing UCLA and South Carolina their first losses of the season. Harmon was awesome against the Bruins, collecting 26 points and five assists, while Booker shined against the Gamecocks with 16 points, nine rebounds and five steals.

Vic Schaeffer’s squad ranks in the top 15 nationally in points per play, points per scoring attempt, effective field goal percentage and Her Hoops Stats Defensive Rating.

Indeed, the Longhorns look like legit contenders, for the SEC and the national title.

Audi Crooks shouldn’t be overlooked in the National Player of the Year race

The race for the Naismith, Wade, Wooden and USBWA national player of the year awards in women’s basketball was shaping up to be a two-player race this season between UConn’s Sarah Strong and UCLA’s Lauren Betts, with perhaps room for another perennial All-American or two like Hannah Hidalgo or Madison Booker.

But Audi Crooks has officially entered the race and should be discussed as one of the most talented players in the country.

Iowa State is 9-0 and hasn’t played a team all that impressive yet, but against their first Power 4 opponent of the season on Sunday, Crooks had her best game yet in a victory over Indiana. The junior forward piled up a career-high 47 points on 19-of-25 shooting, marking the second time this season she’s scored at least 40 points in a single game.

Crooks leads the nation in scoring with 27.3 points per game, is second in field goal percentage with a 73.8 mark, and also leads the country in PER with a clip of 54.2. If Crooks keeps up this play against Big 12 competition, she’ll be a lock for a spot on the All-America First Team, and she might be able to carry the Cyclones to some all-time heights.

North Carolina is the best team in the ACC

Amongst its peers on Tobacco Road, the Tar Heels are the only team living up to preseason expectations. While Duke continued to flounder — losing to South Carolina and a UCLA team without Betts by wide margins — North Carolina went 3-0 at the Cancun Challenge, notching double-digit wins over South Dakota State, Kansas State and Columbia, three teams that danced in March last season.

Courtney Banghart seems to once again have a stout defensive team, as the Tar Heels rank 13th in Her Hoop Stats Defensive Rating and 25th in steal rate. Their win over Columbia marked the fifth consecutive game that the Heels had at least 10 steals. In UNC’s win over South Dakota State, Indya Nivar notched the second triple-double in program history and the first that included steals.

But UNC’s offense is coming along too. Through nine games, the Tar Heels lead the ACC in both 3-point shooting percentage and 3-pointers made — the latter of which they also rank seventh nationally in with 82. UNC has also had seven different leading scorers in nine games.

Two players who have carried the scoring load are youngsters in freshman Nyla Brooks and sophomore Lanie Grant. Brooks is sixth amongst all freshmen nationally in 3-pointers made this season with 21, while Grant has scored in double figures in three games this season and has dished out at least three assists in six straight contests.

Through the first month of the season, North Carolina looks like the ACC’s best bet to secure a top 16 seed in the NCAA Tournament.

• Women's College Basketball

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