THUNDER BAY – Wendesday’s first-round win was just the type of total team effort the Lakehead Thunderwolves are going to need in order to move beyond the second round of the OUA women’s basketball playoffs.
Leashja Grant was her usual self, bouncing back from a tough first half shooting to finish with 27 points and 16 rebounds – her 24th double-double in 25 games this season.
But it wasn’t just the Bahamian Bomber rolling through the visiting Laurier Golden Hawks. She had plenty of help delivering a 74-60 triumph.
Forward Lily Gruber-Schulz had eight points and 14 rebounds. Guard Jerika Baldin nailed a pair of key three-pointers that set the tone in the early going and finished with 13 points. And guard Tiffany Reynolds, who has sat out with a broken foot since the Wolves second series of the new year, was a force in the second half, finishing with 11 points in just 13 minutes of court time.
“With (Leashja) in the post , she kind of gets open looks for us, because teams feel so threatened by her. She knows they’re coming hard at her. She’s wide open and she’s looking at all the teammates that are open, baseline, 45, up top,” Reynolds.
“Even if she passes it off, she reseals, and she just works her butt off down there. We know if we’ve got the open shot we’re going to take it and she’s going to be there to rebound it. If not, we’re going to pass it right back in and she’s going to go up and get an and one.”
Grant was equally generous in her praise of her rookie teammate.
“It was good to have Tiffany back. She will come out and give us a lot of energy and just that boost that we needed,” she said.
“Some of our perimeter shots weren’t falling as much as we’d like, but they will fall against Windsor.”
Grant, who hit just three of 13 shots in an opening half that saw the heavily favoured Thunderwolves double up the Golden Hawks 30-15, hit nine of 12 in the second half, good for a dozen points in the fourth quarter after Laurier cut the Lakehead lead by seven in the third.
“I think I was just hesitating a lot, a lot of shot fakes, which was needed,” Grant said. “I think I readjusted after coach told me to. That was the big difference in my game.”
The Thunderwolves did a fantastic job honing in Laurier’s all-time leading scorer Nicole Morrison, holding her off the scoreboard in the first, second and fourth quarters.
She did torch them for 11 in the third, a quarter the Golden Hawks outscored their opponent 25-18, but the Wolves kept their composure as their lead whittled down to as low as five.
Lakehead guard Nikki Ylagen steadied the ship, hitting a three-pointer to end the third and another to open the fourth.
Up eight, Reynolds jumped in with back-to-back buckets to push the lead into double digits, where it would stay the rest of the night.
Job 1 is done, said coach Jon Kreiner.
“I’m pretty happy with the way we played tonight. The effort was there. I thought it was one of Jerika’s best all-around games, holding Morrison – she had 11 points in that third quarter, but zero the rest of the way,” Kreiner said.
Rachel Woodburn led Laurier with 13 points.
Next up is the No. 8-ranked Windsor Lancers on Saturday, a program just three seasons removed from its fifth straight national championship.
The Wolves have yet to beat a ranked team in 2017-18.
