Posts tagged Jamee Swan
CU women’s b-ball 25 – 5, facing #4 Stanford tonight in Pac-12 semifinals
Mar 9th
Freshman Jamie Swan’s late game baskets iced the win
Story by B.G. Brooks, CUBuffs.com
Overcoming a first half of near and sometimes bad misses, fourth-seeded CU finally took control in the final 20 minutes and ousted fifth-seeded Washington 70-59 at KeyArena.
The No. 18 Buffs (25-5) earned a Saturday night date with top-seeded Stanford (29-2) in the Pac-12 semifinals. The No. 4-ranked Cardinal, which defeated the Buffs twice during regular-season play, advanced by disposing of Washington State 79-60 in Friday night’s first game.
No. 2 seed California (28-2) and No. 3 seed UCLA (24-6) play in Saturday night’s first semifinal game. The CU-Stanford tip is scheduled for 9:30 p.m. MST (Pac-12 Network).
“There’s only one way to look at a matchup with Stanford, and that’s as an opportunity,” said CU coach Linda Lappe. “We’re going to look at it that way.”
Stanford’s two wins against CU were by 17 points (57-40) in Boulder on the opening weekend of Pac-12 play, then by three points (59-56) at Stanford on January’s last weekend. The Buffs believed they had improved at least that much from the first to the second meeting, and they believe they’re even better now.
They’ll probably need a better start than they had Friday night, when they were forced to overcome a first half that saw them miss 13 of their first 16 field goal attempts and go to their locker room to ponder their 28.9 percent (13-for-45) shooting.
“We knew we had to settle down, quit missing easy shots and quit fouling,” said senior guard Chucky Jeffery, who scored 12 of her game-high 19 points in the second half. “Now we know how the floor feels, the jitters are gone and the first (game) is out of the way. Now it’s about quick memory loss and going on to the next one – and it’s a big one. We want to come out and play better Saturday.”
Lappe used 11 players against UW (20-11) and not only did all of them score, all but one of them collected at least two rebounds and all but two contributed at least one assist. In addition to her 19 points, Jeffery also had a game-best four assists, while freshman forward Jamee Swan scored a career-high 15 points and hauled in 10 of CU’s 58 rebounds – UW had 36 – in her 19 minutes of court time.
“I feel like I played the best I ever played,” said Swan, who also blocked three shots. “It was really nice to be out there and not be afraid and have my teammates behind me.”
All of them were. CU’s bench outscored UW’s 33-18. The Buffs had 25 offensive rebounds to the Huskies’ 13, outscored them 40-18 in the paint and won the second-chance point duel 20-9.
“I like how we crashed the offensive glass,” Lappe said. “We needed to get a lot of extra shots in this game and we did. We showed a lot of resolve in chasing down loose balls to get us extra shots.”
Lappe applauded Swan and freshman guard Kyleesha Weston, who contributed two points and six rebounds in 21 minutes. “I’m really proud of our players,” Lappe said. “I thought we stepped up big at certain times . . . it seemed like whoever we brought into the game, we never missed a beat. That allowed us to get some rest so we could make a push at the end.”
In their 68-61 win over the Huskies last month in Boulder, the Buffs limited the Pac-12’s No. 2 scorer, Jazmine Davis, to nine points. Friday night, Davis got 17 – two below her average. She hit two of UW’s seven three-pointers, which were two more than CU allowed in Boulder and two above Friday night’s goal. U-Dub leads the conference in three-pointers made (8.2 a game). The Huskies’ final two treys Friday night came in the last two minutes when they were trying to cut into a 10-point Buffs lead.
UW got as close as four (63-59) before Jeffery scored five consecutive points – a jumper and three of four free throws – and Swan sank two free throws with 13 seconds left to account for a 7-0 run to close out the game.
The Buffs were up 29-26 at the half, but it took them almost 18 minutes to get their first lead. Blame that on shooting that was somewhere south of frigid. UW led by as many as six points (14-8) before the Buffs finally began finding their range – if they ever did.
Lappe said her team was “really excited to play. I think anytime that’s the case you miss some easy shots . . . but I like how we stayed with it.”
After a Jeffery three-pointer – her team’s only trey of the first half – tied the score at 23-23, she hit a pull-up jumper from the free throw line following a UW turnover to give CU its first lead, 25-23, with 2:41 before intermission.
The final 20 minutes would belong to whoever wanted them, and based on the first 21/2 it appeared that was CU. After scoring the first eight points the Buffs surged to a 37-26 lead and were threatening to rip this one open.
It didn’t happen. Talia Walton’s trey started an 8-0 UW run and Davis’ traditional three-point finished it, pulling the Huskies back to within three (37-34) with 16:09 remaining.
CU went back ahead by as many as seven points on an Ashley Wilson layup and maintained at least a four-point lead until a pair of free throws by Kristi Kingma pulled UW to 45-43 with 10:29 to play.
The Huskies could get no closer. Pulling ahead twice by 10 on a pair of layups by Swan in the final two minutes, the Buffs looked like they could begin making semifinal plans for Saturday.
But three-pointers by Heather Corral and Walton, who finished with 13, closed UW’s deficit to 63-59 with less than a minute left. Jeffery answered with a layup and three of four free throws, and when Swan sank a pair with 13 seconds remaining, those semifinal plans to face Stanford were complete.
“We’ll have to make sure we’re ready and playing really well together,” Lappe said. “They’re the giants of the Pac-12 and we’ve got a shot at them.”
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No. 20 Buffs Earn Critical Win Over the Washington Huskies
Feb 24th
Story by B.G. Brooks, Contributing Editor, CUBuffs.com
BOULDER – The No. 20 Colorado Buffaloes outlasted Washington 68-61 on Sunday afternoon at the Coors Events Center and took a large step toward securing the No. 4 seed for next month’s Pac-12 Conference Tournament.
The Buffs, winning their seventh consecutive game, improved to 11-5 in the Pac-12 and moved into a fourth-place tie with the Huskies. But Sunday’s win gives CU the head-to-head tiebreaker, and the Buffs’ remaining schedule appears more favorable than the Huskies’ for securing the No. 4 seed.
CU (22-5) closes the regular season with games at Oregon (March 1) and Oregon State (March 3), while UW (19-8) finishes with home games against Pac-12 co-leaders Stanford and California. The conference tournament is March 7-10 in Seattle.
CU had four players in double figures against UW, topped by Arielle Roberson’s 16. Brittany Wilson added 13, with Chucky Jeffery and Jen Reese chipping in 11 each. Five of Reese’s points came in the final 2:55, with her critical pair of final field goals coming after the Huskies had closed to 59-57.
Jeffery, one of three seniors playing their final regular-season home game, added 13 rebounds for her ninth double-double of the season and 29th of her career. Jeffery left the game with 8.5 seconds to play, while seniors Meagan and Brenna Malcolm-Peck came onto the court about three seconds earlier.
Kristi Kingma led UW with 19 points. Aminah Williams added 12, Talia Walton 11 and Mercedes Wetmore 10. Guard Jazmine Davis, the Pac-12’s No. 2 scorer with a 19.7 average, was held to nine points on two of 13 shooting from the field.
CU never trailed by more than three points in the first half, and after Kingma hit a three-pointer to send the Huskies up 16-14, the Buffs launched a 16-3 run that produced a 30-19 advantage.
An acrobatic put-back by freshman Jamee Swan enabled CU to maintain that 11-point lead (36-25) at intermission. The Buffs got 11 first-half points from Brittany Wilson, who was the only player on either team in double figures.
UW opened the game hitting six of its first 11 shots, but made only three of its final 18 attempts to close the first half. CU hit 15 of its 32 first-half field goal attempts (47 percent) and outrebounded the visitors 25-15.
The Huskies scored the first six points of the second half, pulling to 36-31. The Buffs, meanwhile, had Jeffery leave the game with what appeared to be a left ankle injury at the 19:12 mark. But she was back about four minutes later, and her return might have given CU an emotional lift.
After UW crept to within five points, CU went on an 8-1 run and shot ahead 44-32 with 12:41 to play. Roberson scored six of the Buffs’ points during that surge.
But that 12-point CU lead disappeared quickly.
UW, the Pac-12 leader with 8.5 treys a game, put together an 11-0 run that featured treys by Wetmore and Kingma and another three free throws by Kingma. That pulled the Huskies to within one twice in the final 9:58, but an 8-0 CU that included four points by Jeffery opened a nine-point Buffs lead (56-47).
UW wouldn’t roll. The Huskies outscored the Buffs 8-2 over the next three minutes, closing to 58-55 with 3:38 to play, then pulling to 59-57.
But Reese got her pair of monstrous mid-range jumpers to give CU breathing room at 63-57, and the Buffs hit five of six free throws in the final 48.5 to tuck away the win.
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Buffs Storm Past Arizona 55-42
Feb 16th
Story by Caryn Maconi, CUBuffs.com
TUCSON, Ariz. – So far this season, the No. 21 Colorado women’s basketball team hasn’t been fazed by road competition. On Friday night at the McKale Center, the Buffaloes showed they can create their own energy wherever they go.
Led by sophomore forward Jen Reese’s 15 points, CU rolled to its fourth consecutive win, 55-42, over the Arizona Wildcats. It was the second meeting this season for the Pac-12 Conference opponents, as the Buffs also defeated the Wildcats 79-36 in Boulder in January.
CU improves to 19-5 overall and 8-5 in the conference. Arizona’s loss, meanwhile, was its eighth straight, dropping the Wildcats to 11-13, 3-10.
The Buffs outrebounded their opponents 40-35, grabbing 16 offensive rebounds compared to the Wildcats’ 9. Redshirt freshman forward Arielle Roberson’s picked up a game-high seven rebounds, while Reese and freshman forward Jamee Swan added six each.
In the game’s first five minutes, Arizona forced five turnovers but failed to capitalize offensively, allowing CU to stay even through the 12:42 mark (11-11). CU sophomore guard Jasmine Sborov then put together an “and-1” play which sparked a 14-0 Colorado run to put the Buffs up 25-13.
“We knew we had to take a run, and we just had to keep going,” Reese said. “Our defense goes into our offense, and after a while we got great shots, everyone was finding gaps in either zone or man – so we just kept knocking those down and playing defense.”
Sophomore guard Lexy Kresl’s trey with 4:33 remaining gave CU its largest lead of the first half at 30-15, but the Wildcats responded with an 8-0 run of their own to end the half down only seven (30-23).
Buffs coach Linda Lappe said that with a comfortable lead, her team lost some of its sense of urgency and started to allow the Wildcats uncontested shots.
“You want to make sure that when you have an opponent down, you keep a foot on the gas pedal and keep going,” Lappe said. “I thought there were times when we let up a little bit.”
But as the Buffs turned up the heat out of the locker room, the Wildcats went cold. CU went on a 10-0 run to start the second half, holding Arizona scoreless for more than six minutes.
Arizona senior guard Davellyn Whyte, the team’s leading scorer, put up her first three points of the game and Arizona’s first of the half at the 13:36 mark. While Whyte would score another three to bring the Wildcats to within nine, the gap would never get closer than that.
Colorado ended the game shooting just 37.3 percent from the field, but held Arizona to 32.6 percent. CU also scored 14 points off of turnovers compared to AU’s nine and got 30 points in the paint compared to AU’s 14.
Lappe said her team was prepared specifically to guard Whyte, a player who averages 16.4 points per game to rank fifth in the Pac-12.
“I thought it was a team defensive effort,” Lappe said. “We rotated a lot of different players on her, and I thought it was great to have somebody fresh on her. We know what she can do offensively.”
Junior guard Brittany Wilson opened guarding the standout, but senior guard Chucky Jeffery and junior center Rachel Hargis took turns on her as well.
“Whyte’s a great player,” Reese said. “Stopping her was big – I mean, they had other players kind of stepped up, but our defense won the game for us.”
CU committed 20 turnovers but also had 11 steals, marking the team’s fifth straight game with 10 or more steals.
Still, Lappe said that despite the strong defense, that 20-turnover total was inexcusable for a Top 25 team.
“I told our team we should never have 20 turnovers in February, and that has to become a part of our program’s culture,” Lappe said. “It hasn’t been in the past, we’ve been OK with it in the past, but this year needs to be different.”
CU seeks its fourth conference road win on Sunday at Arizona State (2 p.m. MST).
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