WVU Ladies Drop Opener To Arizona | News, Sports, Jobs

WVU’s JJ Quinnerly drives to the basket Friday afternoon against Arizona. The Mountaineers lost.

MORGANTOWN — And then there had been none …

West Virginia’s women’s basketball group was eliminated from the NCAA Championships in the initial round Thursday in College Park, Md., just as the men’s group was a day earlier in Birmingham, Ala.

The girls, carrying a No. ten seed, ran into an Arizona group, seeded 7th, that just had a small bit also significantly in all places and place with each other a sturdy second-half to claim a 75-62 victory that almost certainly defined the variations involving the two teams.

“I believed our young ladies battled,” Coach Dawn Plitzuweit mentioned. “We began down in the initial quarter, sort of dug ourselves a hole. I believed our resilience and our toughness sort of showed by means of. I believed we continued to perform, to attack.”

The Mountaineers got scuffed about in the initial quarter, providing up 28 points, which was a season-higher for the 24th ranked Wildcats, falling behind 28-17.

“They seriously pushed the ball in transition. We had a really hard time obtaining back and stopping the ball. We fouled a lot in the initial quarter,” senior guard Madisen Smith, getting played her final game at WVU right after a profession that place her amongst the most effective to play at the college.

Recovering its composure in the second quarter, the Mountaineers narrowed the halftime deficit to 40-35 and turned the game in their favor and created a sturdy run at Arizona to narrow the distinction to 50-47.

The Wildcats, nonetheless, did not panic, even although they had been with no their most effective player, Shaina Pellington, and just started pounding the ball inside exactly where Cate Reese could compile a game-top 25 points and exactly where WVU’s former teammate, Esmery Martinez, would carve a double-double out of 13 points and a dozen rebounds.

“It was cool to play against her. Great to see her once again. She’s a fantastic player,” Smith mentioned.

“For me, it wasn’t also weird. I only played with her for a year. I imply, I’m cool with her. We was laughing and joking on the court,” WVU’s JJ Quinerly, who completed the higher scorer with 19 points. “Just a further player, just a further game..

Quinerly, it turned out, was the only offense WVU had right after they drew to inside 3 points. She scored 12 of her 19 points in the second half. At 1 point she scored 11 of the 13 points could muster at that time.

Arizona’s ball handling, it had 19 assists on 30 baskets, and its rebounding, hauling down 49 rebounds to just 35 for the Mountaineers, permitted the Wildcats to handle every little thing about the game.

WVU’s inability to do something on its offensive glass was crushing as it had only three second-opportunity points.

Quinerly would not pin that on a size distinction, although.

“I do not consider it was their size,” she mentioned, “I cannot seriously say it hurt us. Much more that we could have just did improved. We could have did improved just maintaining them off the boards, every little thing, so…”

So, it ended badly. WVU completed with a 19-12 record, almost certainly reaching a lot more that was anticipated in a transition year.

“I told our players in the locker area I do not consider quite a few persons, when this complete factor began much less than a year ago, would have mentioned that our young ladies would have had a opportunity to be battling and have a opportunity to do the factors that we’ve performed this year,” Plitzuweit mentioned.

Just before the game, Plitzuweit says she shared a story with her group that went along with this season.

“I’m not a extremely excellent golfer, proper? When golf balls had been invented, they had been smooth. There weren’t dents or dimples in them. As quickly as they’d get hit by a golf club, they realized the a lot more density they had in the golf ball, the farther it would go,” she started.

“That was sort of like us throughout the course of our time increasing, there was a lot of adversity, a lot of studying.

“When there’s a transition, it is difficult,” she continued. “Our young ladies had to find out a new program, a new style, all these form of factors. We weren’t as effective as we wanted to be early on.

We continued to battle, develop, place some dents in the golf ball, if you will. It kept going additional. When we completed, I believed our young ladies seriously battled and continued to get improved as the season wore on.”

That is just her way of searching toward subsequent year, as if standing on the tee and shouting “Fore!”

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