AMHERST – After nearly a month off the court, UMass junior Makennah White made her triumphant return to the lineup on Wednesday.
White recorded her second career double-double, coming off the bench and collecting 15 points and 11 assists against Saint Peter’s.
“It’s great to see Makennah White back on the floor. She showed everybody what she’s capable of doing – she gives us that extra scoring post player that we need, her physicality defensively as well, and then the (last) piece is her communication. She understands basketball. She communicates it really, really well,” UMass head coach Tory Verdi said. “It did hurt us when she was out, there’s no question about that. So great to see her getting back involved.”
Wednesday’s win was a nice present for the Minutewomen heading into the Christmas break; UMass cruised to a 81-34 victory over a still-winless Saint Peter’s squad that struggled against the Minutewomen’s size. Besides White’s double-double, Sydney Taylor picked up 17 points and five boards in 24 minutes, and Sam Breen came one board shy of her own double-double with 13 points and nine rebounds. UMass will head into its final non-conference game against Dartmouth on Dec. 28 with a 9-3 record.
It was especially nice for the Minutewomen to bounce back with a win 11 days after a tough home loss to Columbia on Dec. 10. The long break was much-needed for UMass to recover from injuries and take a breather, but also for the team to reset and take a look at what wasn’t working.
“The loss to Columbia was really good for us, to be honest with you. There’s always a silver lining. Of course we want to win… but then you go back and you look at it, and you always can learn something from it,” Verdi said. “And I think that both from a players’ perspective and a coaches’ perspective, we all learned something about it.”
Saint Peter’s came out hard early in the first quarter, as Rachel Kuhl drilled a triple and Jada Leonard hit a jumper to give the Peacocks a 5-2 lead just four minutes into the game. That advantage lasted just a couple minutes, as Taylor drained a 3-pointer to spark a 12-0 run over a 2 minute, 54 second span.
UMass continued its offensive push, finishing out the first quarter up 18-9, and it ran away with the game from there. The Peacocks (0-10) never scored more than 10 points in a quarter, and UMass outscored them 23-9 in the second frame to take a monumental 41-18 halftime lead.
The cushion allowed Verdi to deploy his bench more consistently in the second half. Not a single player on the home team played more than 30 minutes, speaking to the volume of minutes the bench received. That was led mainly by White’s 23 minutes as well as Alexzeya Brooks’ 18 minutes of action.
As 2022 comes to a close, it’s become abundantly clear that Brooks has developed into Verdi’s go-to guard off the bench. Of the 12 games she’s played in, she’s cracked double-digit minutes in eight of them, and started against Missouri when Taylor was out with an injury. On Wednesday, she finished with seven points, five assists and three boards.
“[Brooks] did a great job of being in the right place at the right time doing the right things. That’s all that I ask… we’ll score our 73 points a game, so we don’t need them to come in and score, but I need them to fill a void and do the right things and she understands that,” Verdi said. “(Wednesday) she allowed the game to come to her and that’s why her minutes have increased and I’m fairly comfortable and confident with her out in the floor.”
Besides Brooks and White, Laila Fair is still seeing fairly regular minutes as a bench player, looking more comfortable within the team’s system. She finished Wednesday’s game with four points, three assists and two boards in 14 minutes. Verdi is still looking for another guard to step up, whether that’s Stefanie Kulesza or Kristin Williams, who have each gotten more playing time this season.
“Who’s that next guard? Is it Kristin Williams, is it Stef? It’s just a process right now figuring out who that next person is going to be,” Verdi said. “Whoever works hard and is consistent and understands what we’re doing will get those minutes.”