Written By: Ryan Owens
February 28, 2010. Durango, CO. - Coach Mark Kellogg's analogy best summarized the play of the Fort Lewis College women's basketball team over the last two weeks. It's safe to say not even some 20-point victories are played to the level the coach expects of his fourth-ranked Skyhawks.
“I use the light switch analogy: We just turn it on and turn it off a little too much for me right now," Kellogg said. That being the case, the Skyhawks still routed Western New Mexico 87-67 on Saturday night, locking up a first-round matchup with Western State in the Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference Shootout at 5:30 p.m. Tuesday at Whalen Gymnasium.
Statistically, it was another ho-hum victory for a FLC team that's strung together 15 consecutive wins, most by double digits.
The Skyhawks, who finished the regular season 28-2 and 18-1 in league play, put together a 20-6 run early in the second half to turn a 41-35 lead into a 61-41 spread. They outrebounded the Mustangs 39-28, including 13-7 on the offensive glass.
But for Kellogg and the Skyhawks, the game again was plagued with a few too many layups and defensive breakdowns which kept them from going “full throttle."
Western New Mexico, now 7-18 and 7-12 in league play, was able to force 21 FLC turnovers, leading to many of those easy buckets.
The fifth-year FLC head coach knows such lapses won't be as easy to mask during postseason play.
“It's not good enough as we go here on out to be average," he said. “We've got to be above average or extraordinary as I always like to say."
Senior guard Katie Mackey, who led all scorers with 26 points, hinted that perhaps the key is for the Skyhawks to get their swagger back defensively.
“You have to take pride in your defense," she said. “You have to have a chip on your shoulder and say we're not going to let this team score this many points."
Some of that swagger may have been coaxed out by Kellogg's unusually long postgame speech. Mackey said the coach ended the lecture with an uplifting message, which she thinks her teammates took to heart.
“Everyone after that was just like, 'Let's go practice and get after it,'" she said.
The Skyhawks got after it offensively Saturday.
Despite what Kellogg termed as an off-shooting night, FLC hit 47 percent of its shots, and broke the 80-point threshold for the first time since an 83-55 thrashing of N.M. Highlands on Feb. 12.
Also, Fort Lewis crept that much closer to hosting its first NCAA Tournament Regional, something that Mackey said was a key factor in their region a year ago, when Minnesota State-Mankato got on a roll at home and rode the momentum all the way to a national championship, knocking off FLC in the process.
“It's a huge advantage on our end," she said. “It's comfortable at home with your crowd behind you."
Kellogg said he was fairly confident the atmosphere of postseason basketball would snap the Skyhawks out of their mini-funk. Fort Lewis is guaranteed at least one more home game, that being Tuesday's conference tournament contest. Even with the potential to play early-round NCAA games at home, Kellogg knows that another elongated lull could bring a possible dream season crumpling down.
“I just hate to think that all of a sudden because of that we're just going to be able to turn it on again and just keep playing," he said.
In an attempt to “turn it on," Mackey said that the Skyhawks had a discussion earlier in the week that helped point the team back to the basics, and reminded the players of how their team, at its core, is defined, and what it will take to play deep into March.
“We were talking about if you were an outsider looking in at the program, what would you say Skyhawk basketball is known for?" she said.
“All of us talked about our unselfish play, and how we make the extra pass to get the best shot."
Senior Highlights
Box Score
rowens@durangoherald.com
