Featured photo by Preston Todd
Story by Calvin White
MURFREESBORO, Tenn- Savannah Wheeler dominated the perimeter and Iullia Grabovskaia dominated the interior as Middle Tennessee women’s basketball put together another complete game, drilling Northern Kentucky 83-42 at the Murphy Center Wednesday night.
Coming off a season-high 25 points in her last game, Wheeler set a new season-high of 34 points on 13-of-23 shooting to go along with seven rebounds. Wheeler has not scored in double-figures in only three games this season.
MTSU (10-3) trailed 9-2 early but when Grabovskaia checked in for Anastasiia Boldyreva, she immediately went to work on Northern Kentucky’s (2-8) smaller post players. Grabovskaia finished the first quarter with 10 points and seven rebounds in only five minutes of action.
“Her presence alone got us (MTSU) back in the game,” MTSU head coach Rick Insell said of Grabovskaia. “She got every rebound. This had to be one of her best games. She was a force tonight.”
Because of Boldyreva’s production, Grabovskaia has played behind Boldyreva all season. Grabovskaia entered the game averaging 2.1 points and 2.7 rebounds per game but finished with 14 points and nine rebounds on 6-of-8 shooting.
Coming to MTSU from Russia, Grabovskai’s improved communication on defense during games gives Insell more confidence in his backup post player.
“She’s improved drastically,” Insell said of Grabovskaia. “She’s getting better every day. I’m very, very pleased with what she’s doing. We don’t hesitate one second to put her in and I think you saw that tonight.”
As the more physically imposing of the two centers, Grabovskaia is a nice counter to Boldyreva’s style of play. Grabovskaia is more of a bruiser on the interior and likes to finish through contact whereas Boldyreva likes to use her various array of post moves and footwork to free herself up for open shots.
Grabovskaia is someone that Insell depends on to check into the game and immediately do the dirty work like rebound and block shots while providing a scoring threat.
Learning the terminology that MTSU uses in its offensive and defensive sets didn’t take very long for Grabovskaia because a lot of the terminology is the same as when she played in Russia. Although, Grabovskaia does admit that communicating during the game is sometimes difficult.
“Terminology is not a big deal for me because back home we also used these terms,” Grabovskaia said. “It’s not so hard as communicating during the game for example, but I need to talk earlier with them (teammates) because sometimes I forget some words but that’s the hardest part for me.”
Calvin White is the sports editor of MTSU Sidelines. If you have information for a story, you can contact him at [email protected]. For more news, visit www.mtsusidelines.com. Also, follow us on Facebook and Instagram @mtsusidelines, or on X @MTSUSidelines.
