The shot should have been easy. Wisconsin forward Danielle Ward grabbed an offensive rebound under the basket, setting up a tailor-made layup that would have given the Badgers the lead with three seconds to go.
She shot, and the ball sailed over the hoop.
“I was (surprised),” Northwestern senior forward Ifeoma Okonkwo said. “I was on the ground about to have a heart attack. I was like, ‘Why?'”
NU junior A.J. Glasauer snagged the rebound and 2.5 seconds later, the Cats had their second Big Ten win of the year, a 58-56 nailbiter against Wisconsin. It was the team’s first win against the Badgers in nine years.
It wasn’t easy. The Badgers opened up a 14-2 lead less than four minutes into the game, hitting their first six shots while the Wildcats missed six of eight
“We had started off, obviously, not the way that we thought that we would,” coach Beth Combs said. “We needed to turn up our game another level, and we were able to do that.”
NU slowly clawed back as Wisconsin’s shooting came back to Earth. The Badgers only made six of their final 26 shots as the Cats closed the gap to five points at halftime. The lead would have been three were it not for a layup by Ward off an inbound pass with one second left.
Despite the deficit, there were signs that things were going the Cats’ way. NU had fewer turnovers, more steals and only three fewer boards than the No. 1 rebounding team in the conference.
The second half opened with a 3-pointer from freshman Kristin Cartwright. Then, on the backs of upperclassmen Glasauer and Okonkwo, the Cats soon found themselves with a three-point lead.
“This team goes as they go,” Combs said. “When they play well and they come out with confidence and intensity, then our team does.”
Okonkwo finished 7 of 11 for 20 points, six boards, a block and a steal. Her layup two minutes and 39 seconds into the second half marked the 1,000th point of her career.
The basket came off a pass from Glasauer, who struggled noticeably with allergies but still managed to score 17 points.
The Cats had struggled to contain Ward and point guard Janese Banks in the first half, giving up 12 points to Ward while Banks scored six and rang up five assists.
But in the second half NU stymied both.
“We just tried to keep (Banks) baseline and stay in front of her,” Cartwright said. “If she gets you on her hip she’s gonna take it in and probably score so you’ve just got to move your feet and stay in front of her.”
Wisconsin guard Jolene Anderson scored nine points in the second half as the Badgers and Cats traded leads and found themselves deadlocked at 52 with less than four minutes to go. But Glasauer and Cartwright collected steals inside the last two minutes and helped maintain the Cats’ tenuous lead before Ward’s missed layup. A free throw by Glasauer sealed the victory.
“It’s all about heart and hustle,” Combs said. “You’ve gotta lay it on the line every night in this league. We’re finally starting to do that, and good things will happen.”
Reach David Kalan at [email protected].
