No. 12 Ole Miss Women’s Basketball Hosts No. 23 Oklahoma in the SJB Pavilion
OXFORD, Miss. – The No. 12 Ole Miss women’s basketball team returns to the court on Thursday night to welcome their future SEC foe, the No. 23 Oklahoma Sooners, into the SJB Pavilion for a top-25 matchup.
Ole Miss (1-0, 0-0 SEC) opened the regular season with a 91-44 victory over Queens on Monday in a Kids’ Day game. The Rebels were led in scoring by Snudda Collins with 17 points off the bench, while her teammate Madison Scott recorded her 22nd double-double of her career with 15 points and 10 rebounds.
Against the Royals, Rebel transfer players contributed immediately. KK Deans finished the game with six points and six assists, Kennedy Todd-Williams added 10 points and seven boards and Kharyssa Richardson added six points to the stats column.
Oklahoma (1-0, 0-0 Big 12) rolls into Oxford coming off a 92-68 victory over Wichita State on Monday. The Sooners were led on the court by senior guard Aubrey Jones with 19 points while her teammate junior transfer Payton Vernhulst added 16 points in her Sooner debut.
Last season, the Sooners made a run to the second round of the NCAA Tournament with a loss to UCLA 82-73. Oklahoma finished the season with a 26-7 overall record.
Oklahoma also has the two-time Big 12 Sixth Player of the Year in Skylar Vann returning to the court. Against Wichita State, Vann had four points and seven rebounds.
Thursday’s game will be the fifth all-time meeting between the two with the series tied at 2-2. Last season, Oklahoma edged out Ole Miss to pull out a 69-59 win in the fourth quarter.
“Last year when we played Oklahoma, we struggled offensively,” head coach Yolett McPhee-McCuin said.
“I would like to think that we have improved that. We will find out as I expect them to do a lot of the similar things they did last year. Packing the lane, defensive system helping a lot and really not coming outside close to the three-point line.”
Coach Yolett McPhee-McCuin
McPhee-McCuin added that the Rebels have to be able to make plays and do a better job adjusting to that.
“After watching the film, I did not think that was one of my better coaching jobs,” she said. “Super disappointed in some of the adjustments that I made. Now, granted, we had a chance to win the game and we just blew it. I just felt like I could have made a lot of things easier for our team and didn’t. That stuff has already been adjusted because of the type of team that I have and us being able to go to Europe.”
Tipoff is set for 6 p.m. and the can be seen on the SEC Network.
(Feature image credit courtesy of Ole Miss Athletics)
Adam Brown
Adam Brown joins The Rebel Walk as the Managing Editor after being on the Ole Miss beat as a Sports Editor for over 11 years. He is a lifelong Oxford resident. Brown graduated from the University of Mississippi with a bachelor’s degree in journalism.
Prior to The Rebel Walk, Brown was the sports editor of HottyToddy.com covering every Ole Miss sport and local high school sports in the community.
