WBB Beats Cincy, 60-55, at BIG EAST
3/9/2013 12:00:00 AM | Women's Basketball
Seton Hall, who finished the season with a 5-11 record in the BIG EAST for the most conference wins since 2007, won its first BIG EAST Tournament games since a 70-45 win over Georgetown in 2009.
The Pirates advance to face No. 5 seed St. John's University in the second round on Saturday, March 9, at 12 p.m. Seton Hall and St. John's split their regular season series, with the Pirates picking up a 60-51 win over the Red Storm in their regular season finale on March 2, snapping a 10-game losing streak to St. John's that dated back to 2007.
Seton Hall is 1-4 all-time against St. John's in the BIG EAST Tournament, the last meeting between the two schools came in 2005, a 45-42 win for the Red Storm in the tournament's first round.
Friday afternoon's contest was the first-ever postseason meeting between Seton Hall and Cincinnati, and the game hinged on big Seton Hall scoring run to open the second half.
Cincinnati took a 30-28 lead into the half and scored a bucket on its first possession of the second period to grab its largest lead of the game, 32-28. Senior Brittany Morris (Raleigh, N.C.) nailed a three, her first of the game, to knot the score at 32-32 and two minutes later it was senior Breanna Jones (Springfield, Va.) grabbing an offensive rebounds with a put back to give the Pirates a one point lead, their first since the six minute mark of the first half.
Jones bucket was part of what would turn into an 18-2 Seton Hall run over a span of 11 minutes. Cincinnati went more than 12 minutes without a field goal, missing 12 straight field goal attempts while turning the ball over six times before Kayla Cook hit a three with 5:14 left in the game.
Cook's triple sparked a 13-3 Cincinnati run as the Bearcats pulled all the way within three points, 56-53, with 59 seconds to play, but Morris was 4-for-4 from the free throw line down the stretch to ice the game for Seton Hall.
Morris finished with 18 points and was 8-for-10 from the free throw line. It is the 18th time this season she has led the team in scoring. With 984 points in her career Morris now needs just seven points to move into the top 20 in program history and is 16 shy of becoming Seton Hall's 20th member of the 1,000-point club.
Redshirt-sophomore Ka-Deidre Simmons (Newark, N.J.) also scored in double figures with 13 points and a team-high four assists. Jones scored a career-high eight points and pulled down a career-best and team-high nine rebounds. Since being inserted into the starting lineup four games ago she is averaging 5.8 rebounds per game.
Seton Hall displayed a significant amount of balance offensively in the first half. The Pirates' first seven field goals of the game all came from different players and eight of the nine players that saw action in the opening period hit at least one bucket.
Morris started the scoring with a runner in the paint as the shot clock neared expiration and Simmons spotted up for a three from the top of the key to give the Pirates an early 5-0 lead.
Seton Hall maintained that advantage as Jones and then junior Brittany Webb (New York, N.Y.) got in on the action with a pair of mid-range jump shots, but then Cincinnati's Dayeesha Hollins got hot from three, hitting a pair of long-range buckets as a part of an 8-2 Bearcat run that gave Cincinnati a 13-12 lead.
That advantage would be short lived. Senior Alexandra Maseko (Harare, Zimbabwe) banked in a shot to give SHU a 14-13 lead and a little over a minute later freshman Tabatha Richardson-Smith (Bay City, Texas) hit from deep to put the Pirates back up by four.
The rest of the first half was back in forth, with neither team leading by more than three points over the final seven minutes of the period. Four-straight points for Alexis Durley allowed the Bearcats to move in front by three and from there the Pirates kept pace, eventually tying the game at 26-26 on a Simmons three, only to have Cincinnati take a two-point lead into the locker room thanks to an Alyesha Lovett bucket with six seconds to play.
Durley led Cincinnati with 11 points and Lesha Dunn also finished in double figures with 10 points. Seton Hall erased a halftime deficit for just the second time this season and the first time since a victory over NJIT in the season opener.
