Some notes from Maryland’s 80-66 win over Vanderbilt tonight here in Spokane.
* Kristi Toliver had eight assists. She is seven away from the school career record of 583 set by Debbie Lytle (1979-83).
* The Terps got one point from their bench (a Jade Perry free throw), which was their second-lowest total of the season –- no points at Duke on Feb. 17. Maryland’s starters played 22, 38, 39, 36 and 39 minutes. Laura Harper was limited to 22 because of foul trouble. “From our end, when you look at the talent we have and the media timeouts are about five minutes long in the tournament so I just felt today that we were well rested,” coach Brenda Frese said.
* Maryland shot 50.9 percent from the field and are 16-0 when it shoots better than 50 percent. “Toliver handles the ball extremely well and just has a really good sense of the game,” Vandy coach Melanie Balcomb said. “We gave Langhorne position inside and that’s really hard to stop because of their balance -- a great guard, other guards who can shoot it and then you have Langhorne inside. They have all the pieces to the puzzle defensively.”
* Vanderbilt shot 38.7 percent. The Terps are 22-1 when opponents fail to crack 40 percent efficiency. “They were switching every time on pretty much all the screens so I didn’t get very many open looks,” Christina Wirth said. “The ones I did have, I just didn’t knock down.”
* Maryland had four players in double figures for the 19th time this season.
* One point of emphasis for Frese today should be defensive rebounding. Vanderbilt had 19 offensive rebounds. Granted, the Commodores couldn’t cash in (19 second-chance points), but a team like Stanford will.
* Vanderbilt’s three guards -– Jennifer Risper, Merideth Marsh and Jessica Mooney – combined to shoot 8 for 37.
* A key part for Maryland was the last five minutes of the first half. The Terps led 34-16 with 4:43 remaining and led by 15 points at halftime. Last week, they allowed Nebraska to get in the game over the final few minutes of the half. “We talked about it,” Frese said. “We didn’t want to lose our focus and we wanted to play a complete 20 minutes. It was great to be able to see the focus and the intensity we had on the defensive end.”
