Coming off a season-low 37-point effort against Illinois on Sunday, Northwestern struggled to find its offense in the first half against Texas-Pan American. It seemed nothing was working offensively for most of the game.
Even layups were no guarantee.
Sophomore guard Jeremy Nash had a layup blocked in the middle of the first half, and junior guard Sterling Williams missed another to begin the second half as the Wildcats tried to fight their way out of a hole.
Then freshman guard Michael Thompson stepped up.
“Juice” injected some energy into a lackluster offense by driving to the hole, sparking a 16-4 run that put NU into the lead. Behind Thompson’s energetic play, the lead eventually grew to double digits.
The freshman energized the rest of the team, which proceeded to take command of the game.
“With the drubbing we had against Illinois, you start to question yourself as players,” coach Bill Carmody said. “You can see they were tentative out there. They finally broke out of it in the second half. Thompson was pushing the ball down the court and helping guys out. Kevin (Coble) finally got into the flow a little bit in the second half.”
The Cats struggled with their offense in the first half but turned it around, making up 22 points in an 11-minute span to take a 14-point lead.
Carmody said he told his team to start taking the ball inside to try and spark the offense. Thompson, Coble and the rest of the team followed the coach’s advice and charged back into the lead.
Thompson scored 14 of his 18 points in the second half and dished out seven total assists. Coble added 21 points in the final half to spark NU’s comeback.
“Both halves we came out trying to push the ball up the court,” Thompson said. “In the second half we found a lot more openings and got the ball inside and worked from the inside out. We did a pretty good job getting the ball to the low post and a lot of scoring opportunities came about.”
Thompson’s energy spread to the rest of the team, awakening a sleeping offensive monster. NU scored 47 points in the second half – the most points the team has scored in a half since a 52-point outburst against Benedictine on Nov. 20.
Carmody said he told the Cats to stop passing the ball around the horn and start driving off picks. It was all an effort to simplify the offense.
“A couple guys – Mike Thompson and Kevin (Coble) – were trying to be aggressive but almost too quickly (in the first half),” Carmody said. “At halftime we told them: ‘Let’s simplify this. Just start going north-south, driving the ball, get the ball inside, rebound and get up and down the court.’ We got some easy baskets before they got back and that really helped us out a lot.”
The quicker pace and simpler offense helped NU make Sunday’s 33-point loss a thing of the past.
Coble said the team can play at a faster pace as long as they are not forced into it. The Cats still have to play their tempo to stay on the same page and run the offense effectively.
“When we’re going from one thing to the next to the next, we can be really hard to guard,” Coble said. “Sometimes it’s just a matter of getting to that point to where everyone is on the same page, playing together and running through our stuff like coach wants. I think that’s when we’re playing our best. That’s when the streaks come.”
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