For the second straight year, Northwestern will play postseason basketball.
The Wildcats received a berth in the Women’s National Invitation Tournament last Monday and will host Creighton Thursday night in the opening round.
Junior guard Allison Mocchi said she wasn’t surprised by the announcement.
“I kind of expected us to,” Mocchi said. “We’re good enough to play in the NCAA but making the WNIT is still an awesome opportunity.”
The announcement capped a positive string of recent news for the program. On February 28, senior point guard Beth Marshall and sophomore forward Kendall Hackney received All-Big Ten Honorable Mention accolades from the media.
Meanwhile, senior center Amy Jaeschke was named to the All-Big Ten first team by the conference coaches as well as the media. Jaeschke was also placed on the All-Big Ten Defensive Team.
On Monday, Jaeschke racked up an even greater honor, as she was announced a finalist for the 2011 Wooden Award, which is the most prestigious individual honor in college basketball.
“To be mentioned in the same breath with all the other great players that are probably going to play in the Final Four, the Maya Moores of the world,” coach Joe McKeown said, “to be nominated and be up for an award that is named for John Wooden, what that means to college basketball, that’s a great honor.”
Jaeschke scored just six points in her team’s 56-25 loss to Michigan State in the quarterfinals of the Big Ten Tournament, however, so she will be looking for a bit of redemption in Thursday’s contest.
“I’m not a numbers person but what she’s done here has been incredible, way more so than how many points she’s scored or how many rebounds she has got,” McKeown said. “You just want her to have a chance to go out and end her career on a really high note.”
She will get that chance against Creighton, and Mocchi is confident that Jaeschke’s 2-for-12 performance against the Spartans was an aberration.
“We have all the confidence in the world in Amy,” Mocchi said. “She’s our go-to player. She could miss every shot in the game and I would still pass it to her. I think she’s going to come out with something to prove this game. I’m not worried about that six-point fluke.”
While Jaeschke hit just 2-of-12 from the field against Michigan State, it’s not like her teammates were doing any better. As a team, NU shot just 22 percent from the field, including a dreadful 0-of-16 from behind the arc.
“Fortunately, we didn’t have to watch the tape,” Jaeschke said. “Defensively, they really got after us. They took us completely out of our comfort zone. They really rattled us, getting in passing lanes. They had their hands on everything, so for us we’ve really been working the last week and a half to cut down the turnovers and to make a perfect pass to your teammates.”
The Cats are also hoping to get an offensive spark from Marshall, who limped her way through the Big Ten Tournament. Marshall scored just 14 points in NU’s last three games, yet McKeown said it was a “stretch” for Marshall simply to play in those three games after sustaining an eye injury.
McKeown and players alike agreed, however, that Marshall is looking far better of late. Jaeschke reported that the team’s floor general was draining 3-pointers throughout the team’s scrimmage Wednesday, and Mocchi said she was confident Marshall would put up a strong performance.
“She’s been battling a lot of little injuries and little illnesses,” Mocchi said. “She’s one of our toughest people physically and mentally on our team and she always comes out and plays a great game whether her knee hurts, she has an eye infection, her fingers, I’m really confident and she’s looking great.”
Thursday’s match up also gives Marshall a chance to say goodbye to the Welsh-Ryan faithful. She was unable to play on Senior Day against Minnesota, as she recovered from her eye injury.
“We had Senior Day and she couldn’t play,” McKeown said. “Everything she’s done for this program, everything I’ve asked her to do, you feel so bad for her not being able to participate, have to watch that game and now to have another chance to play at home, it’s great for our seniors.”
Thursday’s contest against Creighton will also represent a new challenge for the team’s three seniors. After taking on the same Big Ten opponents over and over again, this will be the first time in five years that the Cats will face the Bluejays.
“You’re so used to playing against Big Ten players,” Jaeschke said. “Some of the players you’ve played against for four years so I definitely know their tendencies, I feel like we’re kind of going back to the non-conference season where you haven’t seen the players.”
At least, Thursday’s match up with an unfamiliar opponent will come in familiar territory: Welsh-Ryan Arena, where NU went 13-4 this season.
The Cats are particularly grateful for this home game since traveling to Omaha, Neb., during finals week would make for something of a challenge. Even with its upcoming game being played at home, NU has already had to move its practices around to accommodate players’ testing schedules.
“It’s kind of weird because practices are really at odd times,” Jaeschke said. “We’re trying to practice around everyone’s final schedule so yesterday, we had practice at 5. Today, we’re at 10. Whenever we can get in the gym, we’re in, and obviously people are just studying as much as they can to get ready for their finals, so kind of just an odd, weird week so far.”
While the intersection of finals week and the WNIT might be a difficult challenge, it is a welcome one, according to McKeown.
“It’s a unique situation, not a lot of teams right now are taking finals and getting ready for a tournament too,” McKeown said. “It’s one of those things at Northwestern, I guess they weren’t really used to playing in March so they never really thought about it.”
Perhaps people ought to get used to postseason basketball, however, seeing as the men’s team has made three consecutive NIT appearances and the women’s team is set to begin its second straight WNIT journey, McKeown said.
“It gets everyone excited here about basketball in March and that wasn’t always the case,” McKeown said.
