Early second quarter, Buffalo leads Niagara by 10. Junior guard Dyaisha Fair leaves the court with a minor injury. Super-senior forward Summer Hemphill is having an off night offensively. Are the Bulls in trouble? Nope.
Enter freshman guard Georgia Woolley.
Flashback: Woolley, from Australia, began her journey to Buffalo after she played a game in Australia against UB legend Stephanie Reid, Buffalo’s all-time leader in assists. Woolley was unstoppable, and after the game, Reid phoned Buffalo coach Felisha Legette-Jack and advised Legette-Jack to recruit Woolley. Legette-Jack took that advice, and successfully recruited Woolley. Mark down one more assist for Stephanie Reid.
So far this season, Woolley who is purported to be an offensive weapon and a dead-eye shooter from downtown, has looked uncomfortable on the court, making just one of her first thirteen 3-point attempts. So what did Woolley do against Niagara?
In the second quarter, Woolley picked up 10 points in a 5 minute span on the game clock. She finished with 23 points in 13 minutes of playing time. No, I didn’t get those numbers backwards, it was not 13 points in 23 minutes, which would still be terribly impressive — it was a bonkers 23 points in 13 minutes. Possibly the best performance by a freshman in December in program history. Woolley added 4 rebounds (all on the offensive end) and two steals, shooting 7-for-10 including 3-for-4 from beyond the arc and 6-for-7 from the free throw line. Did I mention she only played 13 minutes?
Woolley looked much more comfortable and under-control, gaining confidence after making her first two three-point attempts. On her final made three-pointer, mid-way through the third quarter, Woolley caught a long pass in front of the Buffalo bench on a fast break, pump-faked to cause the defender to jump and pass Woolley. Then she calmly slid her right foot behind the three point line, so that both feet were now behind the arc, and without hesitation nailed the shot.
Buffalo, despite 22 turnovers, put up 95 points and held Niagara to 55. The Bulls shot 49% from the floor, and 37.5% from beyond the arc. Fair led the team with 26 points, senior guard Jazmine Young had 14 points and sophomore guard Cheyenne McEvans had 12 points. Fair led the team with 7 assists, McEvans and junior guard Dominique Camp had 6 assists each, and Hemphill had 5 assists (which would have been her career high had it not been that she set a career high of 6 in Buffalo’s previous game). Hemphill led the team with 8 rebound, junior forward Loren Christie and Fair each had 6 rebounds. Christie had 3 blocks.
The Bulls are now 4–2 on the season and host Rhode Island next at 2pm on Sunday December 5, 2021 (ESPN3).
Notes:
- Fair, so far this season, is shooting 48.5% from the floor and 42.2% from beyond the arc. Shooting percent has been the only weakness in Fair’s game before this season. In the previous season, those shooting percentages were 36.5% and 31.6%. As a freshman, Fair’s shooting percentages were 37.2% and 31.4%.
- The Bulls had 14 steals, their 2nd highest of the season.
- Senior forward Ade Adeyeye must have extremely long hair. She tucked her hair inside her jersey, and it still extended a foot beyond the bottom of her jersey, almost like a long black fringe at the bottom of the jersey.
- Despite this and other blow-out wins for Buffalo, two healthy players have not yet appeared on the court for the Bulls (not even in the exhibition win over Daemen): freshman forward Kaelonn Wilson and freshman forward Laney Bone. Other players who have not appeared on the court because of health related reasons are junior center Elea Gaba (hip surgery), sophomore guard Casey Valenti-Paea (leg injury) and freshman forward Saniaa Wilson (unknown injury).