Scoring Drought Victimizes No. 16/14 DePaul on Wednesday

Wednesday, November 28

Storrs, Conn.

6:00 P.M. CT

DePaul University

Connecticut

DePaul

UConn

Scoring Drought Victimizes No. 16/14 DePaul on Wednesday

11/28/2018 9:35:00 PM | WOMEN'S BASKETBALL

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Blue Demons fall behind early in 99-63 loss to No. 2/2 Connecticut

HARTFORD, Conn. – Nobody else in women's college basketball plays the No. 1 and No. 2 teams in the span of 11 days.

Then again, very few coaches challenge their teams like DePaul's Doug Bruno.

Playing their fifth game in seven days, the No. 16/14 Blue Demons were victimized by an early scoring drought in a 99-63 loss to No. 2/2 Connecticut at the XL Center. This came just 11 days after DePaul fell short to No. 1/1 Notre Dame.

Ashton Millender led the Blue Demons with 15 points while Dee Bekelja added eight and Kelly Campbell, Lexi Held and Sonya Morris scored seven apiece. Katie Lou Samuelson paced the Huskies with 24 points, 10 rebounds and seven assists.

DePaul (4-3) started out strong with Millender and Tanita Allen combining to score 11 of its first 15 points. An Allen three-pointer brought the visiting team within 16-15 with 4 minutes, 21 seconds left in the first quarter.

That's when the dry spell hit. For the next 9:54, the Blue Demons could not buy a basket with a number of shot attempts bouncing around the rim and out.

UConn (6-0) took full advantage as would be expected of the elite NCAA dynasty. The Huskies closed out the first quarter on a 16-0 run and then scored the first eight points of the second quarter.

Dee Bekelja connected on a three-pointer with 4:27 left in the second quarter to snap the skid and made it 40-18. UConn outscored DePaul 13-7 down the first half stretch and led 53-25 at halftime.

In the first 20 minutes, DePaul made shot 8-of-36 from the floor including 5-of-27 from beyond the arc. UConn made 20-of-33 from the field and 8-of-10 from deep. DePaul finished 22-of-66 from the floor and 12-of-44 from long distance.

The Blue Demons came out fighting in the third quarter and outscored UConn19-8 behind Millender and Sonya Morris in closing the gap to 61-44. The Huskies scored the next 10 points and ended the quarter with a 78-52 advantage.

DePaul is back in action on Monday with an 11 a.m. game against Temple at McGrath-Phillips Arena on the annual Field Trip Day.

Postgame Notes

DePaul tied the second-highest mark all-time for three-point attempts in a game with 44.
The Blue Demons outscored UConn 27-25 in the third quarter.
Kelly Campbell and Mart'e Grays are 16-for-17 from the free throw line this season while Chante Stonewall is 19-for-21 and Rebekah Dahlman 24-for-28. Campbell had her streak of 15 in a row snapped on Wednesday.
The Blue Demons have gone 102-of-120 from the line this season---85 percent.
With 218 career three-pointers, Millender is fifth all-time and closing on Chanise Jenkins (225).
Millender (578) passed Kris Booker for sixth all-time in career three-point attempts and is one shy of No. 5 Megan Rogowski.
Grays (950) needs 50 points to reach the 1,000 level.
Dahlman (908) is 92 points shy of the 1,000 mark.
Campbell needs eight rebounds to reach 500 for her career.