The Princeton women’s basketball team traveled 3,000 miles to face a Portland Pilots squad on Friday enjoying the best season in its history. The result was a calamity for Princeton as the Tigers suffered their worst defeat in more than two years, falling to the Pilots, 74-55, at the Chiles Center.
The Tigers looked rusty and undisciplined after a 10-day layoff over the Thanksgiving holiday. Facing a relentless, trapping press, the Orange and Black coughed the ball up an astounding 29 times, wrecking any chance they had to notch a fourth consecutive road win.
In some ways, the game was reminiscent of Princeton’s loss to West Virginia in the first round of the NCAA Tournament in March. In that contest, the Mountaineers used a zone press to turn the ball over 21 times against a veteran Princeton squad led by seniors Kaitlyn Chen, Chet Nweke and Ellie Mitchell.
On Friday night, Portland faced a much younger group of Tigers who were playing their fourth game without their leading scorer and floor leader, Madison St. Rose, who went down with a season-ending injury three weeks ago against Quinnipiac.
Portland succeeded in exploiting Princeton’s inexperience right out of the dock, grabbing an early twelve point lead in the first quarter behind a succession of Princeton turnovers. During one stretch, the Tigers turned the ball over three times in 30 seconds, yet somehow the Tigers managed to cut the deficit to 22-16 at the end of the first stanza.
In the second quarter, the Tigers continued to claw back even as they repeatedly mishandled the ball in the face of Portland’s press. Katie Thiers, a 6-foot-2 senior from Seattle, came off the bench to score 4 points on 2-for-2 shooting and remarkably the Tigers were able to draw even at 32 as the teams went to the locker room at the end of the first half.
The Tigers were led by freshman Cristina Parrella, who netted eight points on 3-for-4 shooting, while the Pilots were led by Maisie Burnham, who tallied 10 points on 3-for-8 shooting from the field and 4-for-4 shooting from the free throw line.
Given Princeton’s sloppy first-half performance, coach Carla Berube must have felt fortunate to have a tie game at the intermission. A big reason for that was the production Berube got from her bench, which outscored the Pilots 18-3.
Asked during halftime what adjustments his team needed to make, Portland coach Michael Meek gave the ESPN+ broadcast crew a simple answer: “You know, I think we need to continue to rebound better.” Actually, the Pilots had done a fine job on the boards in the first half, out rebounding the taller Tigers 16-14, and grabbing nine offensive rebounds.
But Meek’s team received his message and built an even stronger edge on the boards in the second half. Portland ended up outrebounding Princeton by a 34-27 margin. Seventeen of their caroms were offensive boards.
In the third quarter, Princeton grabbed its first lead of the game when Parker Hill finished a layup off of a sweet entry pass from Fadima Tall for the first points of the second half. Princeton’s strategy of using its superior height in the post appeared to be working as the Tigers built a five-point lead, 42-37, after Tabitha Amanze scored another layup at the 4:19 mark of the third period.
But everything went downhill after that for Princeton. After Hill and Amanze both picked up their third fouls and were forced to sit, Princeton could no longer feed the post. The offense went stagnant and Portland finished the third quarter on a 14-4 run, taking a 51-46 lead into the final stanza.
The final two minutes of the third quarter were particularly calamitous if not comical for Princeton. The Tigers turned the ball over four times in a row, clearly rattled by Portland’s pressure. The Pilots cashed in each miscue for points. The knockout punch came in the form of a collision between Skye Belker and Thiers as Fadima Tall tried to inbounds the ball against Portland’s pressure. A stunned Belker fell backwards as Alexis Mark picked up the loose change and drained a three-pointer to put Portland on top for good, 51-48. The ESPN announcers called it a Keystone Kops moment, and they weren’t wrong.
In the fourth quarter, Princeton unraveled as Portland continued to turn up the heat. The Tigers failed repeatedly to break Portland’s press and when they did they missed their shots. The Pilots closed the game on a 20-4 run and boosted their record to 9-0, the best start to a season in Portland history.
There were very few bright spots for Princeton on Friday night in Portland. Ball-handling against pressure topped the list of problems, and the fear now is that this issue may persist.
In Princeton’s last outing, a 62-57 triumph over Temple, the Tigers came close to blowing a game that was well in hand after the Owls turned up the pressure and nearly came back to win. On Friday night, the wheels came off completely under Portland’s pressure.
Berube must be concerned by her team’s struggles to handle full-court pressure, a tactic the Tigers will surely face repeatedly from future opponents. But the problems don’t end there. Despite having a clear size advantage against the Pilots, the Tigers utterly failed to control the defensive boards.
Many of these issues are to be expected from a young team playing eight of its first nine games on the road.
Perhaps the one consolation from Friday night’s debacle is that Princeton will have an opportunity to play again right away, albeit against an even more challenging opponent, the Utah Utes.
Princeton (5-3) will finish its two-game western swing with a marquee matchup against the Utes on Sunday at 4 p.m. ET. Given what happened in Portland, no one should be surprised to see Utah employ a full-court press against the Tigers.