THUNDER BAY – It’s not often a basketball player single-handedly outscores her opponent.
Madalyn Weinert came close.
When she left Friday’s contest against the Lakehead Thunderwolves early in the fourth quarter, the Brock Badgers guard, who leads the OUA at 21.8 points a night, had 32 points.
At the time, the Thunderwolves had just 27.
With the Badgers reserves finishing up the final eight or so minutes of the game, the T-Wolves shots finally started falling.
They ended the game on a 12-0 run, hitting four straight three pointers, but it wasn’t nearly enough, the No. 18 Badgers taking the first game of a two-game set at the Thunderdome 63-41.
Weinert, who hails from St. Catharines, was quick to deflect any praise of her night, that included seven rebounds, five steals and three assists.
“Truly it’s always a team effort. If my girls aren’t in the right spot, it doesn’t allow me to get shots and make the right passes for me to get the ball,” said Weinert, who has gone over the 20-point mark nine times this season and crossed the 30-point plateau twice.
Lakehead coach Hugo Boisvert said he’s not surprised by Weinert’s effort.
“She’s the best scorer in the OUA. We knew that was going to be a tough matchup for us. We lost here on a lot of back cuts and transitions. We didn’t necessarily have the matchups we wanted on her and she had a great game,” Boisvert said.
The Thunderwolves were smothered defensively by the Badgers (12-4), and it didn’t help that their shooting eye was off for much of the first half. Lakehead missed its first 11 shots of the night, hit just one in the opening quarter and only put up 15 points over the first 20 minutes of play.
It’s starting to become a bit of a disturbing trend, Boisvert acknowledged.
“It’s in our heads, more so that anything,” he said. “There’s a lot of things we do much better in practice than e do in games and that’s a little bit of a concern,” he said.
LU guard Ally Burke, who led the T-Wolves with a dozen points, said the team has plenty to improve on as they hit the final stretch of the regular season, a playoff berth still an outside possibility for a team sitting at 4-13.
“Overall I think we need to get better defensively. And right now, in the first half our shots weren’t falling, but they were in the second half, so we’re hoping to just carry that into tomorrow,” Burke said.
A different approach to guarding Weinert also might be in order, she added.
“I think we need to just adjust and try to keep the ball out of her hands as much as possible. It also might help to have some different people on her so that one person isn’t chasing her in circles the whole night,” Burke said.
Lakehead shot 42 per cent from the field on the night, but made 23 turnovers, compared to just 12 made by Brock.
Tip-off for Saturday night’s game is 6 p.m.
