Texas Tech University Athletics
USA Women Improve to 3-0 with Win Over China
August 12, 2005 | Women's Basketball
Aug. 12, 2005
IZMIR, Turkey - The 2005 USA Women's World University Games Team shot past China 107-54 Friday, Aug. 12 thanks to 59 percent shooting from the field and a combined 47 points from post players Jessica Davenport (Columbus, Ohio/Ohio State), Sylvia Fowles (Miami, Fla./LSU) and Liz Shimek (Empire, Mich./Michigan State). Fowles, who shot 11-of-13 from the field, narrowly missed a double-double with 23 points and eight rebounds. With the victory, the U.S. improves to 3-0 in preliminary play.
Texas Tech's Erin Grant finished with two points and one rebound, as she was 1-for-3 from the field in the win.
"What's so unique about this team is that each post player is different from another," said USA and Harvard University (Mass.) head coach Kathy Delaney-Smith. "You can put one in to stop the lob, you put another in to stop the hook, another one to stop finesse plays. They're all different and you can't stop just one of them, you have to know how to stop all of them."
China kept the score close early, as Wang Jing hit a 3-pointer with 5:34 left in the first quarter to tie the score at 10-10. The Americans responded after Davenport made two straight baskets to put the U.S. ahead by four at the 4:32 mark but a jumper by Wang nine seconds later brought the Chinese within two.
That would be as close as China would get for the remainder of the game, as a 3-pointer from Megan Duffy (Dayton, Ohio/Notre Dame) ignited a 11-0 U.S. run, including six points from Fowles, to put the red, white and blue on top 25-12 with 1:12 remaining in the quarter. A 3-pointer by Zhao Jing with seven seconds left on the clock in the first quarter brought the score to 27-15.
Three straight baskets by China to open the second stanza decreased the American lead to eight, 29-21, with 8:12 left in the first half. Davenport responded 15 seconds later with a three point play and Candice Dupree (Tampa, Fla./Temple) brought the score back to double digits, 32-21, off a feed from Duffy.
A 16-5 American run that saw six players score over the next 5:48 gave the U.S. a comfortable 20-point lead with 48 seconds remaining in the half. Wang hit a jumper with 18 seconds left to close out first half scoring, as the Americans entered the locker room with a 50-32 advantage.
"We had the height advantage," said Delaney-Smith. "We have a tendency to crowd each other and that makes it easy to double up. They tried to double up early on but I thought we got better at spacing and timing as the game went on."
"You don't know what is going to happen until you get on the floor," said Shimek. "We just got the ball to the open person and made the extra pass. We worked on taking the ball to the baseline and looking for the post players. We're bigger and stronger than them so that's what we wanted to do."
In addition to Fowles' 23 points and nine rebounds, which were both game-highs, the U.S. was led by Davenport and Shimek's 12 points and Brandie Hoskins' (Dayton, Ohio/Ohio State) 10. Hoskins also dished out a team-high five assists and Lisa Willis (Long Beach, Calif./UCLA) snatched five steals.
Wang paced China with 12 points and a game-high seven assists.
In other Group B action, Poland (2-0) secured a 79-39 win over South Africa (0-2).
Courtesy of USA Basketball - for a complete box score, log onto - www.usabasketball.com
