U.S. Improves to 3-0 in U19 World Cup With Win over Hungary
by dillon77 (2019-07-23 10:14:42)

The United States probably played its best game of the u19 Women's Basketball World Cup Tournament in Thailand, with a 95-50 win.

Everyone on the roster got into the game, including top 2020 Prospect Caitlin Clark, who had 8 points and 4 assists in just about 20 minutes of playing time (see link to box score).

I was wondering if ND would send someone (more than) halfway around the world to show Clark the degree of interest ND has in her. Chris Dailey of UConn is there, as well, and Paige Bueckers has already verbally committed (UConn is reportedly interested in some players on Canada's team.) Interestingly, Clark and Hailey Van Lith is the only player on the team who is either not already in college or committed to one.

As many of you know, the u19 team -- as was the u18 team last year -- is coached by Jeff Walz. While ND fans have their issues with him in many regards, I've got to give a tip of the hat for the service he and assistant coaches like Cori Close of UCLA are giving to the Uig .S. National Team.

Here are his comments on the team. Note his emphasis on cutting down the dribbling and passing faster in the sequence (I've got to think he's addressing everyone from Bueckers and Clark to Hailey Van Lith, who is noted for a lot of dribbling. Not surprisingly, Van Lith is being heavily pursued by Louisville (as well as Baylor and Oregon State).

“I was really pleased with our effort today,” said Jeff Walz, USA U19 and University of Louisville head coach. “Offensively we were much better. We stopped dribbling the ball so much, which has been a problem for us all through training camp. We’ve got players who are the best on their high school teams, the best on their college teams and they have to dribble on those teams in order for something good to happen. That’s against what we’re trying to get them to do. We want fewer dribbles, more passing and find the open player early. In the first two games we did a very poor job of that. I thought today was much better, and you could see it on the offensive end."






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