This was no easy weekend for North Carolina. It started with a win against then 5th ranked Stanford on Friday, followed by a victory over Prairie View A&M on Saturday and concluded with a hard fought victory over the hosts Hawaii Wahine on Sunday. The Wahine were a tough team. They played strong against Stanford on Saturday and gave the Tar Heels a memorable test on Sunday.
Unlike the other two games, there was a video feed for fans to watch the game. From the start of the game it was pretty clear that Hawaii wasn't intimidated at all. They jumped out to a 4-0 lead and caused some miscues for the Tar Heels. The Tar Heels had difficulty especially with sixth year senior Shawna-Lei Kuehu. She scored in a variety of ways to get to 28 points, one off her career high. 14 of those points came from the free-throw line. I was really impressed with her. I'm told she is the only native Hawaiian on the team. She probably could have played at a lot of schools. It's admirable she chose to stay at home. (photo from www.kaleo.org)
Yes, I was that impressed with how this young woman played. She gets a spot on this page. There won't be too many opposing players that do. I admired her pride in her team, her energy and determination. It also made me that much prouder of our team that they came out with the victory in this game. Hawaii had the crowd behind them. This was a true road game for UNC. The Wahine came at them in a lot of ways; but the Heels always had an answer. You guessed it: Experience, Leadership, Depth/Balance, Chemistry and of course Talent.
Latifah Coleman: 16 points, 1 rebound, 3 steals, 1 assist (Associated Press Photo)
Latifah (Coleman) had a great tournament. She's generally a facilitator and continued to be so; but like I said in a previous post she does what needs to be done and when the Stanford Cardinal clamped down on Allisha Gray, she stepped forward with a big game and continued to score well for the entire Showdown all the while continuing to play great defense.
Allisha Gray: 19 points, 9 rebounds, 3 assists, 1 steal (photo from www.goheels.com)
Allisha had her best game against Hawaii scoring inside and outside, posting up on the inside and coming off screens for long shots. She shot 70% for the game and flirted with a double double which likely only eluded her due to some foul trouble. Gray and Coleman earned spots on the All-Tournament team and Latifah Coleman was named the MVP. (Associated Press Photo)
Latifah Coleman, Head Coach Sylvia Hatchell and Allisha Gray with the Championship trophy and Individual Awards from the Rainbow Wahine Showdown
Brittany Rountree: 5 points, 1 rebound, 1 assist, 1 steal
Brittany's shot wasn't falling yesterday; but she did the things that don't show up in the box score. She kept her head up, kept the offense moving, and played great defense on the perimeter. And at winning time, she stepped to the line and drained 5 of 6 free throws to seal North Carolina's victory.
Xylina McDaniel: 9 points, 8 rebounds, 1 steal, 2 blocks, 1 assist (Associated Press Photo)
This was a bit of a guard oriented game; but our post players were really important because due to their overall success, the perimeter players had more space. They did great work on the inside taking up space, rebounding the basketball and Xylina McDaniel in particular came up with some big baskets. Stephanie Mavunga patrolled the paint and provided a wall with her 6'4" frame and added three more blocks to her growing total. At this pace she's bound to set some kind of record.
Stephanie Mavunga: 5 points, 5 rebounds, 1 assist, 3 blocks, 1 steal (Associated press photo)
Of course there were quite a few contributors in this game. Our friends in the black and white shirts were let's say, very active yesterday. So I'm super appreciative of the part our bench played in this victory. They came off in with energy and provided essential minutes, maintaining the lead, getting rebounds, and scoring. With this being a three day, three game adventure, you're not going to survive without depth and North Carolina's reserves came through in this one.
Jamie Cherry: 10 points, 6 assists, 1 rebound, 1 steal (Associated Press photo)
On the night, North Carolina had 16 assists and Jamie had 6 of them. That's a gift that she as a freshman in her first Thanksgiving tournament could come in and contribute this way. She's still learning but it was so encouraging to see her remain aggressive and use her vision to get the ball to her teammates in scoring position.
Danielle Butts: 6 points, 6 rebounds, 1 assist, 2 steals
Danielle continues to pack a lot of productivity into the minutes she gets on the court. Spelling not only guards, but post players as well due to her ability to "climb the ladder", she is just a great asset for the Tar Heels.
Jessica Washington, N'dea Bryant, Megan Buckland and Hillary Summers provided some important minutes when fatigue and foul trouble set in. They did what you want from your bench. They played at the right pace, provided a defensive presence got a few buckets and did not turn the ball over.
Success!
Before the team departed on this trip, I remarked that I hoped there would be good basketball, good memories, no injuries and lots of smiles. I'm grateful it all came to pass and that it came with three wins. This is a great group that loves and celebrates each other.
Here I believe they are celebrating Latifah's MVP award. (Associated Press Photo)
I hope the group enjoyed Hawaii. We were afforded some notes from several players letting us in on how the trip went when they weren't on the court. They did an island tour and they visisted the Pearl Harbor Memorial. I remember visiting that memorial with my husband. It's beautiful, very moving. And I share Megan Buckland's sentiment about the Pineapple. It was hard to eat them or drink the juice for a while after that trip.
Thanks to all my fellow Tar Heels supporters who made the trip. The boss of the house (our budget) would not allow us to make the trip. But we had a great time with our family. I'm so grateful for those that were able to make it, especially the players' families.
The competition remains tough and the weather will take a turn as the Tar Heels travel up to New Jersey this week to face Rutgers for our ACC/B1G Challenge game. But I won't talk about that now. I'll end this post with one more shot of the Rainbow Wahine Showdown Champs. (Associated Press Photo).
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