Xavier WBB 2023-24

[muskiefan82]

Xavier is in Norfolk to take on Old Dominion tonight. We'll see if they can get their first victory in 340 days. Coming up on a year.

No.

[Xville]

I really don’t understand what seems to be Xavier’s stance on women’s basketball. They aren’t taking it seriously which is very odd concerning the way the women’s game is growing and making money in a lot of places.

[X-band '01]

[HomerCecil]

With Mississippi Valley State's win against McNeese last week, Xavier now owns the longest losing streak in Division I at 24 in a row. They have a fifth straight game against a non-power conference school tomorrow (Kent State) to try to snap it.

[STL_XUfan]

With Mississippi Valley State's win against McNeese last week, Xavier now owns the longest losing streak in Division I at 24 in a row. They have a fifth straight game against a non-power conference school tomorrow (Kent State) to try to snap it.

And we choked it away.

[X-band '01]

That leaves Miami on the road, Oakland, Cincinnati and SIU-Edwardsville as the only realistic chances for wins this year. Ouch

[HomerCecil]

That leaves Miami on the road, Oakland, Cincinnati and SIU-Edwardsville as the only realistic chances for wins this year. Ouch

It does seem like Miami is the weakest of the three MAC teams on the schedule. I feel like that one is a really good chance for a W.

[HomerCecil]

With the men's game against Oakland starting at 6:30 and the women's game against Miami starting at 7 last night, after the men's game ended I was able to flip to ESPN+ to watch the last few minutes of regulation and OT in Xavier's 58-57 loss to Miami. It was not a fun hour to be a Musketeer fan.

That was an enormous opportunity, served up on a silver platter, to get a win.

For some context on Miami, they went 12-19, 7-11 in the MAC last year. After the season, their head coach abruptly resigned in late April after the university discovered texts between the coach and a player that indicated they were in a relationship. Miami had to hire a new coach late in the offseason, and their roster also turned over quite a bit. They have eight new players this season and were picked to finish last in the MAC. They had started this season 0-3, with losses to Vermont (78-62), Louisiana Monroe (68-52) and Western Kentucky (63-43). This is a likely sub-300 Division I team.

Both of these teams struggle to score. One bright spot was it looked like the game was over in regulation until Kaysia Woods hit a very long three-pointer to tie the game at 52 with 7 seconds left. It seemed like if either team could go up by more than one possession in overtime, the other team would be too offensively challenged to overcome it.

In OT, Xavier went up 57-54 with 3:10 left on a layup from Nila Blackford, who is definitely the only post presence this team has and the only player averaging more than 3 rebounds per game. But she then fouled out on a moving screen on Xavier's next offensive possession. Here are Xavier's last offensive possessions with a 57-54 lead in OT against a team that can't score:

01:49 MISS 3PTR by LóPEZ,DANIELA (X up 57-55 after Miami made 1/2 free throws)
01:18 MISS 3PTR by SCARLETT,MACKAYLA (X up 57-56 after Miami again made 1/2 free throws)
00:51 MISS 3PTR by WOODS,KAYSIA (still up 57-56)
00:28 MISS 3PTR by WOODS,KAYSIA (*still* up 57-56)
00:00 MISS 3PTR by GARCIA ROIG,JúLIA (trailing 58-57)

Another play that made no sense to me was that, after missing a shot with 1:14 to go, Xavier PG Tae'lor Purvis seemed to intentionally foul a Miami player with less than 10 seconds on the shot clock, sending Miami to the line. Miami missed both free throws, but I do not understand why you foul with a lead up by a point against a team that has shown little to no ability to score the ball.

A last note is that Mackayla Scarlett, who scored 22 points for Xavier, was injured on the last play of the game. Miami missed a long shot, but got the offensive rebound and winning layup. The Miami player tangled with Scarlett to get the rebound, and she went down with what looked like a high ankle sprain.

It's unfair to pass any judgment on Coach Chambers given what she has to work with, but we also said that with the first couple years for Coach Moore. Seems to be a pattern at this point. I would think that most head coaches with 10 years of experience who were hired to lead a Big East program could find a way to beat a winless MAC team that has a rookie head coach in his first head coaching job, but...

Providence is another bad Big East team, but I only really see Oakland and SIU Edwardsville as realistic shots for wins the rest of the year. By the metrics, the worst team on the schedule was Miami. 26 losses in a row--if you thought the Georgetown men's program was a mess under Patrick Ewing, this program wants you to hold its beer.

[IM4X]

Maybe it’s not fair to judge coach Chambers yet. Maybe she simply didn’t have enough D1 level talent when she got to X and maybe she didn’t get hired early enough to be able to land more before the season. Still, what ever the reason, this season’s women’s X team is looking like they’re on their way to become an even worse team.

Why?

While last season’s women’s X team didn’t win a single BE conference game, they still found a way to win every non-conference game prior to the start of their conference games.

This season’s X team has yet to win even 1 non-conference game. It very possible they may not win a game this entire season.

Yikes. I hope Coach Chambers can get her team playing good enough to at least win a few BE games.

[X-band '01]

They're actually a pretty decent defensive team, but they cannot score to save their lives. It's worse than the Travis Steele offense.