Following a tight loss to Iowa on the road Tuesday, Northwestern returned to Welsh-Ryan Arena Sunday to host No. 16 Michigan State.
Despite a strong start that allowed them to stay in the game early on, the Wildcats (7-13, 0-9 Big Ten) couldn’t survive a second-half Spartan surge (18-4, 8-3 Big Ten), dropping their eighth-straight contest 89-75.
Down 11-10 with just over three minutes to play in the first quarter, graduate student forward Taylor Williams fought her way to the rim through traffic and tossed the ball up for a layup. After a stop on the other end, junior guard Melannie Daley pulled up from midrange. Then it was junior forward Grace Sullivan’s turn.
Suddenly, the ’Cats were up by seven at the end of the first quarter as they seemed unbothered by a typically-potent Spartan defense that averages 13.2 steals per game.
Behind senior forward Caileigh Walsh’s 12 first half points, NU made it to intermission tied 40-40.
After trading baskets to open the third quarter, the Spartans quickly jumped out to a multiple-possession lead and never looked back, torching the ’Cats from beyond the arc with seven-made threes in the second half.
Williams led all NU scorers with 18 points Sunday.
Here are three takeaways from NU’s eighth-staight loss to Michigan State:
1. A first half to remember
Stacked up against a dominant Spartan squad that averages 81.7 points per game while conceding just 59.9, NU’s hopes of keeping pace with the visitors seemed bleak from the get-go.
But after Walsh scored the game’s first points on a contest three and followed up with a layup, the ’Cats had set the tone early and kept the momentum rolling through the opening period.
Aside from Lau — who made valuable contributions as a facilitator — all seven players who stepped on the court in the opening half for NU made at least one shot from the field.
As the lead see-sawed back and forth during the final minutes of the second quarter, back-to-back fastbreak layups by Williams and graduate student guard Kyla Jones allowed NU to make it to the break tied at 40 apiece.
2. Lau can’t sustain her first-half playmaking
Junior guard Caroline Lau is in the midst of her slowest shooting season of her career. Averaging just 4.6 points per game, Lau has only notched double-digit scoring in just three games this year, including her second-highest scoring output in NU’s loss to Iowa Tuesday.
But against the Spartans, Lau demonstrated a playmaking prowess that was critical to the ’Cats competitive first half.
The Westport, Connecticut native recorded seven rebounds and four assists in the first half alone. She leads the Big Ten with 6.1 assists per game.
As NU’s hopes of pulling off an upset victory drifted away, Lau’s day was cut short as she recorded her fourth personal foul early on in the fourth quarter.
3. A second half to forget
The ’Cats couldn’t maintain their first half performance as the Spartans steamrolled to the finish line on 17-of-28 second-half shooting to turn what had once been a competitive showing into another convincing loss for NU.
Michigan State outpaced the hosts by 10 points in the third quarter, converting deep-ball opportunities on three consecutive possessions to close out that frame.
The fourth quarter saw more of the same as NU had no answers for the visitor’s 61.5% shooting in the final 10 minutes.
As the clock clicked down, coach Joe McKeown used the opportunity to give his young roster playing time as the game concluded with three freshman on the court.
Freshman guard Kat Righeimer drained a 3-pointer in the contest’s final 90 seconds.
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Twitter: @AudreyPachuta
Related Stories:
— Rapid Recap: Iowa 85, Northwestern 80
— Women’s Basketball: Northwestern suffers another blowout loss
— Women’s Basketball: Northwestern falls to Illinois 85-60, remains winless in Big Ten slate
