Memphis proves to be too much for WSU women

The Wright State women’s basketball team simply had no answer for the Memphis Tigers Saturday afternoon.

The Raiders were outscored in the second half 56-24 en route to a 109-68 defeat. Memphis’s Nicole Dickson torched the Raiders for 34 points and eight rebounds in just 29 minutes played. WSU head coach Mike Bradbury called Dickson a “matchup nightmare.”

“She’s (Dickson) a tough matchup,” Bradbury said. “She’s a big three player or a small four player and we just couldn’t find anybody that could guard her.”

In addition to Dickson imposing her will on a now 6-7 Wright State team, Memphis forced WSU into 23 turnovers which led to 36 Tiger points. The Tigers also had the advantage on points in the paint (52-26), second chance points (22-11), fast break points (16-2), and bench scoring (36-17.)

“They (Memphis) get out and press you and they’re big and athletic,” Bradbury said. “They separated themselves and the game kind of got away from us.”

Memphis also out-rebounded the Raiders by a 51-30 margin creating extra possessions and opportunities the Tigers ended up cashing in on.

“They were bigger and more athletic,” Bradbury said. “Rebounding is a problem and I don’t know any way to fix it. We’re so small we have to make up for it in other areas.”

Three Raiders managed to finish scoring in double figures as Ivory James and KC Elkins scored 14 and Kim Demmings finished with 13.

Despite the lopsided final score Wright State was able to remain down only a couple of possessions until around the first media timeout of the second half. Memphis then went on a 19-1 run to put the game out of reach. With the Raiders out of hope of catching Memphis Bradbury made the decision to bench many of his key players to give his reserves some playing time.

“The game had gotten away from us at that point,” Bradbury said. “I decided to take Kim, KC, and Breanna Stucke out.”

The Raiders did briefly lead scoring 10 seconds into the game on a close range jumper from Ivory James, but within the minute Dixon hit her first three pointer of the afternoon and Memphis would never relinquish the lead – pushing it to 43 before the final buzzer.

Two main concerns Bardbury pointed out with his team at the moment are depth and a lack of focus.

Both Courtney Boyd and Mylan Woods are out for the season with injuries and sophomore transfer Tayler Stanton is recovering from an injury of her own as she saw limited minutes against Memphis.

“We have nine players and quite frankly the kids off the bench have never played Division I basketball,” Bradbury said. “The quality of depth is the biggest problem.”

Despite all of the issues facing the women’s team Bradbury still is looking on the positive side of things.

“We’re still not even halfway through our season and with the schedule we’ve played our record is not all that bad.”

Conference play opens up for WSU next as the Raiders will travel to Milwaukee and Green Bay this Thursday and Saturday to being Horizon League play. WSU can take solace in their conference record is the same as everyone else in the league at this point – 0-0.