Colorado University Athletics
Brooks: Beard-Fails Knows Her Role For Bruins Rematch
March 05, 2014 | Women's Basketball, B.G. Brooks
SEATTLE - In today's lesson of What Goes Around, Comes Around, consider the development of Zoe Beard-Fails: When she was a kid in Herndon, Va., preparing to attend and compete in basketball camps, her father offered a lasting piece of advice:
"My dad used to tell me that you had to stick to what you know - and that was to 'clean up the trash,'" Beard-Fails told me Tuesday. "When you see a loose ball, go after it. When you see the ball being shot, you need to box out. You do what you can to get the ball. I was always taught to 'clean up the trash' - do the extra stuff."
Years later (although probably not that many), without any prompting, Beard-Fails' coach on the University of Colorado women's team characterizes her as, well, "a garbage player . . . I really don't want to say garbage player, but to me that's a great term," Linda Lappe said. "It means she's always around the ball, it means she's got a great feel for the game, it means she's hustling and doing whatever our team needs. To me that's invaluable; you can't really measure it. And that's what we need her to continue to do."
There's a theme - not as shoddy as it is complementary - developing here, and Lappe needs it to envelop her team as it begins play on Thursday in the Pac-12 Conference Tournament. Do the little things, attend to details, know your roles and follow Beard-Fails' lead and be a garbage player - "clean up the trash," as Stephen Fails instructed the youngest of his three children.
CU, seeded No. 9, plays No. 8 seed UCLA at 1 p.m. MT in KeyArena. If there's a familiarity between the Buffs (16-13, 6-12) and the Bruins (13-17, 7-11), it's because it will be their second meeting in six days. Last Friday night in the Coors Events Center, CU clocked UCLA by 20 (62-42) to sweep the season series. On the opening weekend of Pac-12 play, the Buffs won 61-59 in L.A., but Lappe says the first meeting was so long ago she hardly remembers it.
"This (the tournament rematch) seems like the back-to-back games we had against Utah (Jan. 29, Feb. 2)," she said. "For us right now, I don't necessarily look at it like it's really tough to beat a team three times. We're trying to win a game and it just so happens that our next game is against UCLA.
"We go into the conference tournament taking it one game at a time and trying to be really focused. We want 100 percent of our effort and focus on the team we're playing and the game we're playing. We can't worry about what happened the last time we played them. We have to be really dialed in and get ready."
IF LAPPE REALLY NEEDS HER MEMORY jogged about that first game with UCLA on Jan. 5, I'll provide it. Her team was ranked No. 12 at the time, had just been stunned by USC (55-45) in its Pac-12 opener and needed a bounce-back win. The Buffs bused across town and got it, temporarily righting themselves and their season.
But the 'W' in Westwood came with Jen Reese (15 points) and Jasmine Sborov (11) in the lineup - and neither will play Thursday against the Bruins. CU lost Sborov (foot) 14 games into the regular season and the hard-luck Reese (shoulder) 27 games in - or with one regular-season game remaining.
Reese didn't play in the second half last Friday against UCLA, but CU managed quite well without her because, said Beard-Fails, "I know a lot of us believed we needed to step up because Jen is such a big part of our team. We wanted to go out, give it everything we've got."
The 6-2 Beard-Fails played a scoreless 3 minutes against the Bruins, but two days later against the Trojans in a 66-59 loss she stayed true to her "janitorial role," working for 10 points and collecting four rebounds and one steal in 9 minutes off the bench. Said Lappe: "There have been quite a few games where she's been quite efficient, but that was one of her best overall games."
Beard-Fails has played in 22 games (no starts) and averaged 2.8 points and 1.3 rebounds in 6.5 minutes. She said Lappe routinely tells her first-year players "that being a second-semester freshman, you're basically a sophomore . . . the more I've gotten to play and from watching my teammates from the bench, I've learned a few things. I feel a lot more comfortable and with players hurt I feel like I need to be there for my team. I need to be focused and work as hard as I can."
The Buffs have had nearly half a season to adjust to life without Sborov, and the adjustment to not having Reese has been gradually underway for three games now. After a foot problem sidelined Reese for much of the overtime win at Arizona on Feb. 23, she played the first half of the UCLA game and not at all in the regular-season finale against USC after her shoulder injury was diagnosed.
"It's always tough to lose a player at this point in the season," Lappe said, "but we've had a little time to adjust to life without her. It just means everybody else has to step up . . . our post position is pretty deep - we got a lot of good post players that can contribute and play significant minutes."
More than any season she can remember, making adjustments due to injury has Lappe's modus operandi. In addition to Sborov's and Reese's ailments, there have been a variety of aches and hurts that have shelved players for six games here, three or two games there, etc. "There probably have been as many little injuries as I've ever had on a team," Lappe said. "So many people missed from two to six games. I don't think we've the same starting lineup for any more than seven games . . . it's been (players) in and out, in and out, in and out and that really makes it hard to get any sort of continuity on the floor. You find a lineup that works really well together, then it's changing because of injuries."
BUT ABSENCES CREATE OPPORTUNITIES and players have taken advantage. Along with Beard-Fails, fellow freshman Haley Smith has responded in Sborov's absence at guard. "We need her to continue to hit that 15-17 foot jump shot and play good defense like she's been doing," Lappe said, adding the team response to injuries is best when all other positions step up. "I think it's all the other players as well. Do the guards step up in (Reese's) absence? If (forward) Jamee Swan steps up and our guards don't . . .
"We don't have one player we need to step up, it's got to be a complete team effort. Everybody has to come focused and with the right mindset. That said, we don't need anybody to do anything spectacular, anybody to have the best game of their life, we just need everybody to be solid. And that will go a long ways."
Sophomore forward Arielle Roberson said the Buffs "have no choice but to adjust" to not having Reese for the Pac-12 Tournament. Reese, noted Roberson, remains supportive on the bench and relays what she sees happening on the court to her teammates.
"That's a great thing to have," Roberson said. "You listen to Jen; she's the hot shot. But I think we've come together as a team. In that game (UCLA), we were thinking we had to do it for her and as long as we continue to have that mindset of not having Jen but having everybody else to step up to make it an even greater team."
By early March in a conference tournament, there are very few surprises left. Teams have played each other at least once and a season's worth of scouting reports is available. "That's why it comes down to execution, defense and rebounding - just being who you are as a team and being confident that that's good enough."
If the Buffs defeat the Bruins for a third time, their reward is a 1 p.m. MT match up on Friday against top-seed Stanford. The Cardinal (28-2, 17-1) defeated the Buffs 87-77 in mid-January in Boulder, but Lappe said thoughts of a rematch are nowhere to be found among her players.
"We can't think about that . . . if you do you might not get there," she said. "You focus on the team you're playing and move on to the next game. And really in a tournament like this you trust that all your preparation all year long has helped you prepare for any team you might face at any point in time."
It's win and advance, lose and head for the hotel, then the airport. "I'm so excited . . . we all are," Beard-Fails said. "This has been a tough season with all the injuries. We're ready to show the Pac-12 what we've got. We just want to do our best."
Contact: BG.Brooks@Colorado.EDU
