EVANSTON, Ill. — There are games in the Big Ten where scoring comes at a premium. That’s exactly what was on the billing inside Welsh-Ryan Arena on Wednesday night.
Indiana women’s basketball faced off with Northwestern in hopes of a bounce back win after the Hoosiers were downed by No. 1 UCLA on Jan. 4, and the Wildcats entered 0-4 in conference play.
In the middle of the fourth quarter, the Hoosiers needed a jolt to pull away from a Wildcats team they had outmatched in many facets of the game including experience, proven success among rostered players and flat-out statistical areas.
This half decade of Teri Moren coached ball has told us one thing: Indiana women’s basketball has been a forward first offensive attack. With a slow night from junior forward Lilly Meister and senior forward Karoline Striplin, the Hoosiers were left wondering where this jolt was coming from.
There’s a second gear that any good women’s basketball team needs: guards that can take over a game. On Wednesday, that guard for Indiana was junior Shay Ciezki.
With 6:38 left in the fourth quarter, Ciezki snagged a handoff on the right wing from Striplin. She made a path as sharp as a crescent from the wing to left block and layed the ball in with contact. Indiana led by 5 with that basket.
On the following possession, Northwestern sophomore guard Casey Harter drained a 3-pointer, but Ciezki matched as she hit the floor from contact on her 3-point make.
Five minutes later, a late push allowed Northwestern to take the lead with 66 seconds left, but Ciezki put the Wildcats' upset effort to bed with a deadly step back triple. The basket put Indiana up 61-59.
A couple of series later, Ciezki then iced the game with two clutch free throws to make it a two-possession game. The Hoosiers took the 68-64 victory.
Ciezki has proven she has the ability to take over games with effective playmaking as she added five assists along with her game-high 20 points. It’s why she came to Indiana.
Ciezki was one of the most feared shooters in the Big Ten during her time at Penn State. She shot 41% as a freshman and 36% as a sophomore. She’s shooting 34% so far this season.
Ciezki got off to a rough start, taking what felt like an eternity to hit her first 3-pointer in a Hoosier uniform. Realistically, it took 80 minutes before her first make of the season against Butler University on Nov. 13.
But if there is a time for Ciezki to flush her few struggles from the early part of the season, it’s now.
Meister and Striplin are featured offensive performers for Indiana. But when they aren’t hitting on all cylinders, Ciezki provides a spark on the floor as a playmaker and consistent shooter — a second gear.
But when this team is clicking from down low there’s still a level of potential this team hasn’t tapped into quite yet. When Indiana is struggling inside, it can look to Ciezki for a score or assist to an open teammate looking to make a play.
While Ciezki is the latest of the Hoosiers’ dynamic guards over the past few seasons, she’s different from former guards like Grace Berger and Sara Scalia.
“Anytime she can hit shots, she certainly makes shots, she certainly becomes somebody that spreads the floor for us and another person out there that (opponents) have to guard,” Indiana head coach Teri Moren said. “I wouldn’t say that Shay is just a 3-point shooter. Shay has more to her game than just that. That’s what makes her so dangerous.”
While Ciezki’s role in this edition of Indiana women’s basketball has a different be-all and end-all goal than Berger’s and Scalia’s, Moren cited similarities between the three.
“The toughness, there is a fearlessness, there is no fear,” Moren said. “When it comes to leaving it all out there, that's what the great competitors do. They live for those moments, those big moments where somebody has to step up and make big plays for us.”
Moving forward, Indiana is going to face some better Big Ten competition in the form of the new-look No. 24 Iowa at 3 p.m. Jan. 12 at Carver-Hawkeye Arena in Iowa City, Iowa.
A key for Indiana to win that game will be how it responds when things are not going the Hoosiers’ way. If the Hoosiers can’t get anything down low, then they must get buckets from the floor via Ciezki, graduate student guards Chloe Moore-McNeil and Sydney Parrish and junior guard Yarden Garzon.
Follow reporters Dalton James (@DaltonMJames) and Savannah Slone (@savrivers06) and columnist Ryan Canfield (@RyanCanfieldOnX) for updates throughout the Indiana women’s basketball season.
