Michigan women's basketball shutters UNLV, 71-59, to advance to NCAA tournament 2nd round

Michigan women’s basketball spent February and the first week of March trying to get back in sync after playing seven games without star sophomore Laila Phelia.

Turns out, all they needed was Maddie Nolan to find her stroke. The guard hit seven of 10 shots from the field, including four 3-pointers, as the sixth-seeded Wolverines knocked off 11^th-seeded UNLV, 71-59, in the first round of the NCAA tournament in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.

Nolan finished with 18 points, one of three U-M starters to score in double figures. Leigha Brown had 17 points and added seven assists while Emily Kiser had 18 points and 10 rebounds. Phelia had eight points and 11 rebounds.

Brown summed up Nolan's impact succinctly in her postgame interview on ESPNU: "When Maddie’s hitting shots like she was today," Brown said, "it’s hard to beat us."

Making it equally hard to beat them, the Wolverines almost completely shut down UNLV star center Desi-Rae Young, who entered averaging 18.2 points a game. Young had just 11 points on 5-for-12 shooting on Friday. Essence Booker led UNLV with 16 points, but needed 21 shot attempts (with seven makes) to get there.

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Next up, the Wolverines will face the winner of Friday’s game between 3-seed LSU, the first- and second-round host, and 14-seed Hawaii. The winner of Sunday’s game then heads to Greenville, South Carolina, for the Sweet 16.

Friday’s victory seemed anything but assured early in the first quarter, as both teams struggled to hit their shots and UNLV took a 7-5 lead with 6:24 remaining in the period. But Nolan tied it up with a jumper about 30 seconds later, and the Wolverines took over from there, holding the Rebels to just two points over the remainder of the quarter on a 12-2 run.

Phelia capped the first-quarter run with a slashing, left-handed layup after driving all the way from halfcourt in the final three seconds. As the horn went off, she flipped the ball up and over her defender. It bounced a couple times on the rim, then dropped through.

The Wolverines kept it going in the second, with Maddie Nolan hitting a 3 pointer from nearly the LSU logo eight seconds in, and Cameron Williams converting an Emily Kiser steal into a layup about 30 seconds later. Finally, 1:14 into the quarter, Kiara Jackson made a layup to slow U-M’s 17-2 run.

U-M stretched the lead to 13 as Kiser split a pair of free throws with 6:08 left in the second, but UNLV climbed back into it in unlikely fashion: The Rebels, whose 33.8% 3-point percentage ranked 75^th in the nation, hit back-to-back 3s, with Kenadee Winfree and Justice Ethridge connecting from deep on either side of an offensive foul by Phelia. They were the only 3-point makes for the Rebels in the first half, with eight misses. But U-M’s defense recovered quickly, allowing the Rebels to score just once more over the final five minutes to take a 28-20 lead into halftime.

UNLV came out after the break hot, hitting its first four shots while getting within three points. But again, Michigan had an answer, unleashing a 12-0 run with five points from Kiser, three from Maddie Nolan, a jumper by Brown and a layup from Phelia to stretch it to a 17-point lead with 2:34 remaining in the quarter. The Rebels answered with a 10-4 run, but the Wolverines were fully in control. They finished the third quarter with 26 points on 9-for-13 shooting, including three 3-pointers on three tries.

Friday’s win marked the fifth straight NCAA tournament in which the Wolverines have won in the first round. Last season, Michigan advanced all the way to the Elite Eight before falling to Louisville. To get that far again, U-M could need to beat 3-seed Utah in the Sweet 16, with a potential reunion with Big Ten rival Indiana waiting in the top half of the bracket.

This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Michigan women's basketball shutters UNLV to advance in NCAA tournament