Women's Basketball Invitational: Isles senior class paved the way
It definitely wasn’t the way the five seniors on Texas A&M-Corpus Christi envisioned the end of their college basketball careers.
One game away from playing for a Women’s Basketball Invitational championship. Swarmed and plagued by a quick Memphis team. All the confidence in the world and, in less than two hours, it’s completely over.
But that’s tournament life, as this group discovered during a 80-55 defeat Thursday night in the WBI semifinal at the Elma Roane Fieldhouse. The first taste of the postseason ended one game shy of the WBI title game.
For three seasons, the Islanders showed little inclination to move into the postseason beyond the Southland Conference Tournament, with this group of seniors going as a six seed in the event as freshmen and eight seeds the past two seasons.
But this season, the team finally pushed the team to an upper-tier Southland seed — a three — and helped the program to the postseason for the first time since the 2005 WNIT run. The team claimed a program-best 24 victories this season and managed to get three games deep in the WBI before Memphis’ quick and aggressive defense ended things.
Women's basketball at ASU getting noticed
Anna Freeman, a forward from Thomasville, said she has heard people talk more about Appalachian State's women's basketball program in the past week than ever before.
And she likes what she has been hearing.The Mountaineers will play Memphis for the championship of the inaugural Women's Basketball Invitational at 2 p.m. today in Boone.
"This is huge for us," Freeman, a graduate of East Davidson High, said after Thursday's semifinal win over College of Charleston. "It's building so much confidence for us, and we're a young team.... Just this week, people around campus were talking about us and asking about our game -- that hasn't happened all season long. It's nice. People are starting to notice."
posted by Helen at 10:49 AM
