UND answers season-opening loss with win over Minot State

Nov. 8—GRAND FORKS — UND head coach Dennis Hutter made it clear that last Monday's loss to Minnesota Crookston fell short of "the standard we're trying to set here."

The Fighting Hawks' 84-68 win over Minot State Sunday afternoon at the Betty Engelstad Sioux Center was much closer to the framework Hutter and his coaching staff are trying to build in Year 2, though it wasn't perfect.

"I'm happy they won, I like this team a lot," Hutter said. "I think they play hard, they compete, they're invested in the program, they're invested in each other. I think that goes a long way, so I believe they deserve to have some success. It's nice to bounce back a little bit tonight. Not sure how clean it was, especially toward the end there a little bit. Again, one of the things people ask me is, 'How do you get a team to win?' And I'm like, the first thing you've got to do is they've got to be in a winning situation. They've got to learn how to hold a lead, how to play with the lead in the fourth quarter. We have a new group, and we didn't get a chance to do that the other night, so it was nice to see them learn how to play with the lead a little bit."

The Hawks scored 22 fastbreak points and showed better ball movement offensively, finishing with 17 assists on 28 made baskets. Junior guard Ciona Wells hit a jumper on the fastbreak to give UND a 14-12 lead with 3:32 left in the first quarter, and the Hawks led the rest of the game.

The Hawks' lead ballooned in the second half. They led by as many as 24 points in the fourth quarter, though Minot State went on a 12-4 run to close the game.

"I thought we had some moments of what we're looking for," freshman Jayden Sonnenberg said. "We had a lot of good transition and (forced) a couple shot clock violations, and that's what we're looking for as a team. But I think the next step is just stringing that together and having four quarters, not just one or two or a little bit here and there. We need to be able to come together and put a full game together."

Jayda Maves had a major bounce-back performance after shooting 1-for-15 against Minnesota Crookston. The senior guard scored a team-high 19 points against the Beavers, going 9-for-17 from the field.

"I just have this support system through teammates and coaches," Maves said. "Whether my teammates get on me, or my coaches get on me, I just respond very well. That's something that I've grown to learn how to do. And even if my shot's not falling, I'm was like, 'Just drive, just get in there,' and I have no fear anymore."

Maves shot 1-for-6 from 3-point range but found success with quick drives and finishes at the rim.

"Jayda can do a lot of different things," Hutter said. "Jayda's got explosiveness. She's quick, she's fast, handles the ball well, scores on both sides of the rim. She hasn't shot it to a level that I think she would be comfortable with; she hasn't shot it very well, not to the Jayda standards that we have seen in practice. That will come, like we talked about today, especially early — I'm like, 'Jayda, you've got to stop being a shooter, we need you to be a scorer now. You've got to find ways to score: getting downhill, getting to the free-throw line, scoring in transition, scoring out of your defense, just different ways to score.'"

Sophomore London Harris added 14 points, while Wells finished with 11. UND's bench contributed 32 points, led by Sonnenberg's 13.

The Hawks were also better defensively, holding Minot State to 41% from the field. Junior forward Lara Dobbins and senior guard Taryn Hamling were the Beavers' two biggest threats; Dobbins scored 21 and Hamling finished with 18.

Hutter, however, still hopes to see more out of the defensive effort.

"It was a little better, not where it needs to be," Hutter said. "I just feel like we're not physical enough. The word I've been using all week is resistance. I just don't think we play with a tremendous amount of resistance. We have to find a way to defend the ball at, let's say, 22 feet, and not let it get down to 12 feet, something along those lines. I just felt like there were times that we're holding them up, we're holding them up, and they turn the corner on the last dribble and get themselves there."

UND improved to 1-1 on the season. The Hawks will now take to the road for two games, beginning with Milwaukee on Thursday.

"It's another challenge, it's another thing we haven't done," Hutter said. "Before we played Crookston on Monday night, we said, 'We haven't played a game, we don't know how we're going to handle a competitive situation, because we haven't had one yet.' Same thing can be said for on the road. We haven't played on the road, we haven't really traveled, so it's another challenge that we have to work through to find out what kind of team we have. I do believe that connected teams have the ability to win on the road, they really do, so I just feel like it's a great opportunity for us to build off tonight and take it onto a new setting."