Women’s Basketball

Lindsey Pulliam doesn’t remember exactly when it happened. But at some point in the third quarter, the junior guard went into Northwestern’s huddle and told her teammates to start getting her the ball.

The Wildcats had lost their double digit lead in the third quarter, so Pulliam got the attention of her teammates, and her teammates listened.

They passed the ball to Pulliam and watched her play one of the best games of her career.

Pulliam scored 32 points in No. 23 NU’s (18-3, 10-2) 81-73 win over the Wolverines (13-7, 4-5), with the junior guard leading the Cats on a fourth quarter run that sealed the win. After the game, NU athletic director Jim Phillips found Pulliam in the locker room and told her that her idol, Kobe Bryant, would have been proud of the performance.

“That game was for Kobe Bryant,” Pulliam said. “That guy means so much to me, and I took so much from him in terms of my mentality and some of (the) things in my game. Dr. Phillips just said it in the locker room –– 24 plus 8 equals 32.”

The Cats trailed 45-44 in the third quarter, and then Pulliam led NU on a 28-17 run. Pulliam scored 20 of her points in the second half, including four late free throws that put the game away for the Cats.

NU used a small lineup with senior forward Abi Scheid down the stretch as a way to create more space for Pulliam and the rest of the offense, and the lineup led the Cats to one of their best scoring quarters in conference play.

“We started to loosen up their zone and getting better shots,” coach Joe McKeown said. “Scheid and (Pulliam), they were crafty and didn’t rush. They waited and were patient, and then they knocked down shots as we did a better job getting them the ball.”

Scheid added 13 points and made three three-point shots, and senior center Abbie Wolf had 12 points and seven rebounds. NU shot 45.9 percent from the field and finished the game with seven made shots from beyond the arc.

For the fourth time this season, the Cats won by single digits, and the win moved them back into second place in the Big Ten standings, behind only No. 18 Iowa.

After watching several conference games slip away in the final few minutes last year, McKeown said the team has proven that it has learned how to win in the Big Ten. Led by Pulliam, NU is off to its best start of McKeown’s tenure and is currently slated to be a top-four seed in the NCAA Tournament.

“The Xs and Os become somewhat irrelevant, and you’ve got to be willing to say, ‘get me the ball and get out of the way. I got this,’” McKeown said. “And that’s why I recruited Pulliam. That’s what she does.”

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