|
|
|
Posting Up - Scoreboard - Top 25 - Features - Notables - Team of the Week - Live Audio |
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
Coverage of the women's Final Four |
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
National
semifinal game stories Messiah
70, Ohio Wesleyan 57 Emmanuel (28-3) lost to 3-time defending national champion Washington U. in the evening's first semifinal contest. The national championship game will tip off at 8 p.m. on Saturday. Ohio Wesleyan started the game cold, missing its first eight shots from the field, but the Bishop defense kept the team in the game, allowing Messiah only eight points in the first five minutes before senior guard Leslie Welsh hit a jumper that put Ohio Wesleyan on the scoreboard. Messiah used its size advantage to build its lead late in the half, getting three baskets from Amy Hitz and another by Christina Vouriotis on offensive rebounds. The Falcons' biggest lead was 11 points on three different occasions, and when Vouriotis scored with :54 left in the half, Messiah still led 32-22. Then the Bishops caught fire. Junior guard Elizabeth Edinger assisted a basket by senior post Anissa Haynes, then stole the ball and scored to bring the Bishops to within 32-26 with 20 seconds left. Welsh then picked up a loose ball and fed junior guard Michelle Wolfe for a three-pointer that made it 32-29 with :10 left. The Bishops weren't done. Ohio Wesleyan forced another loose ball, which resulted in a held ball with :01 remaining and Messiah inbounding the ball underneath the Ohio Wesleyan basket. Haynes tipped the inbounds pass, but the ball went right to Hitz, who laid it in for a momentum-seizing bucket at the buzzer. Messiah took charge right at the beginning of the second half, scoring on its first 3 possessions while Ohio Wesleyan missed a shot on its first possession and then turned the ball over on its next 2. The Bishops kept the game within reach and whittled the deficit to 6 points when Wolfe drilled a 3-pointer and senior wing Jessica Viertlboeck added a basket to bring Ohio Wesleyan to within 58-52 with 7:53 left in regulation time. Messiah answered with an Amy Murray basket but would only score once more from the field during the remainder of the game. During one stretch, Ohio Wesleyan forced 6 missed shots in a row by the Falcons, but the Bishops could not take advantage of the Messiah drought and were unable to close the gap any further. "We didn't seem to get into the flow of our game tonight," said Bishop head coach Nan Carney-DeBord. "We were forcing turnovers but not capitalizing on them. We've been behind at the half before and thought we would make a run in the first 5 minutes (of the second half), but it just wasn't our best 5 minutes. When we did get our defensive possessions, we didn't convert." "I don't think it was running out of gas," said junior post Katy Sturtz. We just didn't give it our all tonight, but I'm not going to say we played bad. Our style of play tonight was totally different than what we played before." Sturtz led the Bishops with 16 points, while Welsh and Wolfe finished with 10 points apiece. Wolfe grabbed a team-high 9 rebounds and Haynes led the Bishops with 3 assists. Viertlboeck finished with 8 points and 3 rebounds. "We've got to have Jess and Katy scoring and rebounding for us to beat a good team," Carney-DeBord said. "Messiah played with a tremendous amount of heart and desire." |
Rankings and links to all D-III teams
Contact Us |
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
