Five Thoughts on Oklahoma State’s 94–56 Win Over Northwestern State

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STILLWATER — Jacie Hoyt’s squad is 3-0 after dismantling Northwestern State 94-56 on Monday afternoon. The defense was worse than usual, but as with the previous games, this one never really felt too competitive.

​The biggest change, other than the 11 a.m. tipoff, was a crowd dominated by school children here for the annual Class at the Court game. Hoyt said the Cowgirls practiced for this one by pumping in “kids’ noise” at practice.

“That would be my fourth time playing in front of kids like that, and honestly, I love it,” Stailee Heard said. “I love how they come energized and ready to watch us play, and you know it’s fun playing in front of them. … I just want to hope the kids want to come back and watch us play.”

Here are five takeaways from the victory, which included a very loud “6-7” moment when the team hit 67 points.

1. Liv McGill’s Shot Showed Up

After starting the season 0-for-4 from 3-point range, McGill drained her first three 3-point attempts in the first half on Monday morning. She finished the game 3-of-6 from behind the arc, which put her one shy of 100 career 3-pointers.

This was a lot more reflective of who she was last season at Florida, where McGill knocked down 26% of her team-high 178 3-point attempts.

With her 3-point shot falling, everything else followed as McGill finished with a team-high 23 points after shooting 7-of-15 overall and 6-of-8 from the line.

This put McGill one point short of her season-high, but in that one she scored eight points off free throws. So, this was a much better showcase of her shot overall.

She also finished with seven assists, putting her one shy of the team lead.

2. Stailee Is All Right, Right?

After taking a hard fall on her back that ended Heard’s day early on Friday night, she was seen wearing a back brace when off the court multiple times on Monday morning.

Heard still got the start and seemed her normal self throughout the early portion of the game. She seemed a bit stiff halfway through the second quarter when walking over to the scorer’s table to check in while wearing the brace.

Once she got back out there, Heard came to life almost immediately, sprinting the width of the court to contest a 3-pointer. Shortly after that, she raced the length of the court to drop in a layup on a fast break.

Heard finished the game with eight points after knocking down 2-of-4 3-point attempts while playing just over 25 minutes. This put her on the court less than two minutes shy of her involvement in the opener. She also paced the Cowgirls with eight assists and matched LA Sneed to finish with a team-high four steals in Monday’s win.

After the game, Hoyt mentioned that she asked her longtime player if she should coach her differently to protect her back. It sounds like Heard shut that down rather definitively, and if there was any doubt about that dynamic, it was on full display during an exchange between the two during the press conference on Monday.

“You’re not going to know if she’s hurt or not because she’s not going to carry it that way,” Hoyt said. “That is a superpower of hers is her ability to handle hard things. … I mean, what do you have like a broken finger or thumb or something?”

“Finger,” Heard said.

“Your finger, see, I don’t even know half the time when she is hurt,” Hoyt said.

3. Audi’s Second-Half Surge

Crooks caught the pass from McGill and split two defenders in the paint for the layup and still drew the foul with 2:25 left in the third quarter.

That was just one of a game-high seven fouls drawn by Crooks, something which Hoyt referred to in her post-game press conference as the “Audi effect.”

This is arguably one of the biggest differences between this team and Hoyt’s previous groups. It will be interesting to see how much OSU relies on Crooks’ ability to win in the paint once the schedule picks up.

Crooks scored 12 of her 13 points in the second half. It sounds like this was rather intentional, as Hoyt mentioned by talking to Crooks about halftime adjustments she could make and said the other Cowgirls did a good job sensing Crooks’ frustration and finding her the ball in spots where she could make an impact.

Crooks continued her streak of 101 games scoring at least 10 points after she finished Monday’s game with 13 points, thanks largely to her work at the line where she knocked down 7-of-11 free throws.

Through three games as a Cowgirl, Crooks is averaging 16.3 points and 7.7 rebounds.

On the other end of the court, Crooks finished with a season-high three blocks after recording one in each of her first two games this season.

4. No Time to Lose

Heard wasn’t the only one who created some stir over injury concerns. McGill hit the court hard at one point and left the game after a long time on the ground. She didn’t leave the bench area for treatment and later returned to the court.

So clearly, she was fine, but Oklahoma State didn’t need her to return to the court. Hoyt wasn’t asked directly about this decision, but the coach was asked how she knows when to sub the starters out for good during these lopsided nonconference games.

“Some of these games where we’re winning by a lot are really hard because I think sometimes the idea for a lot of people is that they shouldn’t play late,” Hoyt said. “And while there’s a lot of truth in that because we’re trying to protect bodies and things of that sort, I’ve got a team that I’m coaching that has not played together at all.”

This Oklahoma State team has big expectations, and the schedule looks like it ramps up for real beginning on Sunday with a trip to South Dakota State. Hoyt made it clear that the Cowgirls can’t chase their big goals without putting in the time together right now, even if that means playing starters late in blowout games.

“So despite this, I mean, I don’t even look at the score to be honest,” Hoyt said. “I’m just so focused on getting better every possession and doing our job each possession, and in a game like today, I couldn’t have even told you what the score was. I’m just trying to figure out how we can get them reps together because we’re going to be thrown into the fire very, very quickly, and we need that practice time together. We need those reps, those game reps, because we just simply don’t have them.”

5. Nene Has the Momentum

For the second consecutive game, Nene Ndiaye finished perfect from the floor, this time shooting 5-of-5, which included a pair of 3-pointers to finish with 12 points on Monday.

She is now shooting 13-of-18 (72%) overall this season and 7-of-10 behind the arc (70%), which puts her well ahead of her career-high shooting percentages set last season at Rutgers when she finished 46% overall and 42% from 3.

Ndiaye will cool off as the season progresses, but she has a habit of scoring early when the team needs a bucket. That was true again on Monday when she answered a Northwestern State 3-pointer with a fastbreak layup 90 seconds into the game.

She then hit another fastbreak layup in the opening minute of the second quarter, which was OSU’s first points following another Northwestern State 3-pointer.