Quote from BSUBass77 on February 24, 2023, 10:51 am

Yes the Women's team beat lowly SJSU last night by eight. The SJSU win was expected since they have had only one MWC win so far.  The Broncos were up by over 20 in the early 4th quarter after two Pasco 3s swished.  But then the wheels started to come off and with about a minute to go SJSU had cut it to five.  Certainly the refs assisted by calling every touch foul for SJSU and refusing to call several fouls for BSU, but that wasn't the real problem. The win was pretty secure if BSU hit their foul shots.  Turnovers in the entire game plagued the Broncos, which resulted in 22 for the game.  SJSU, a much worse team had only 11.

Let's take a look at BSU's turnover problems during the winning (with one loss to UNLV) stretch.  Starting with AFA on 26 Jan, BSU had 26 TOs and won by 5. A close loss to Wyo, BSU improved with only 9 TOs.  But a five point win against SDSU showed BSU with 23 TOs. Some improvement with a win over Nevada and 14 TOs.   And again improvement with only 13 against Fresno (but Fresno only had 8). Then a win over New Mexico BSU still struggled with 18 TOs.  BSU played UNLV straight up even until the last two minutes of the game and lost by 13, but the 11 turnovers were not a factor.  Another close win for BSU against AFA resulted in 21 TOs. The USU blow out still had 22 BSU TOs.  We have one more away game with CSU.  BSU will probably get a first round bye regardless of the win, but it would be great to go into the tournament strong.

So we could blame the turnovers on so many freshmen playing increased minutes, and they certainly have their problems.  Mia Hanson with 53 handled the ball as PG most of the year until she was injured (BTW she was back against SJSU).   Bayes with 59 and Pasco with 37, then Thompson with 21 since she returned from injury.  But the ones that are concerning are the upperclass.  Muse, Lalotte and Naro and to a lesser amount Ostlie just can't hold on to the ball.

So, BSU should meet or exceed the preseason expectations of finishing 7th in the regular season.  We are currently 5th with one game to go.  Having three freshmen with multiple Freshmen of the week honors is a very positive sign, plus Tatum Thompson has been really finding her shot in the last 10 games after missing all the pre-conference games.  She is automatic from 17 feet and more athletic than the other bigs.  So there are a lot of positives to build on for the future, hoping that we keep all the freshmen.

But, Gordie and the staff really have to drill the players during the off season in breaking the press, making better passes and avoiding the risky pass that results in a fast-break for the other team.  These turnovers can be drastically reduced, which will result in larger margin wins against bad teams and competitive games against the good teams.

Go Broncos.