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March 14, 2008
The IUP women's basketball season came to a stunning end Friday night with a 62-56 loss to Mount Olive in the opening round of the NCAA Division II East Region tournament at Memorial Field House. The loss ended the top-seeded Crimson Hawks season at 27-5 while eighth-seeded Mount Olive improved to 21-10 and will face Shepherd in the semifinals on Saturday. IUP set a school record this season for most victories and won its second straight PSAC title but fell short of the ultimate goal of the Division II Elite Eight. The win for Mount Olive came in its first ever appearance in the NCAA tournament. The Trojans would not have made the field of 64 if not for its upset win over Anderson in the championship game of the Conference Carolinas tournament last week. Jahzinga Tracey led IUP with a game-high 17 points and Hillary Shope scored all 12 of her points in the first half. Staci Heberling scored nine points and had a game-high 10 rebounds. The Crimson Hawks were held to just 23.1 percent shooting in the second half and scored only 17 points over the final 20 minutes after leading 39-35 at halftime. Lakeisha Monroe led Mount Olive with 16 points and five assists and Keona Corley tallied 10 points. Helen Moore had eight points and eight rebounds. IUP built as much as a nine-point lead in the first half with a layup by Shope making it 37-28 with just 1:36 left before intermission. But the Trojans scored seven of the final nine points of the stanza, including five by Brittney Robich, and pulled to within four on a basket by Sierra Medeiros with only nine seconds left in the period. Neither team led by more than six points in a tightly contested second half. IUP took its final lead of the game at 50-49 on a free throw by Tracey at the 11:22 mark. Neither team scored for the next 2:23 before a Tomeka Pritchard 3-pointer gave Mount Olive the lead for good at 52-50. A basket by Tracey made it 57-56 with 2:22 remaining, but the Crimson Hawks did not score again, missing their final six shots while a basket by Alisa Jones, a free throw by Moore and two charity tosses by Monroe sealed the deal for the Trojans. |
