Women’s Basketball: UL bench pulls through for WBI championship

Bobby Ardoin, Special to the Advertiser, March 26, 2016

 

 

With the leading scorer and primary defender fouled out in overtime, it became time for the remaining UL players to finish the job.

Although the situation might have had many of the 600 or so spectators in tiny Earl K. Long Gym on the edges of their seats, Cajuns’ head women’s basketball coach Garry Brodhead saw no need to worry.

“We’ve tried to create confidence in our players all season. They are gamers and they’re going to find a way. They know what it takes to compete,” said Brodhead.

And they did just that.

The UL bench provided enough points and late-game defense during two overtime periods in which UL outlasted Weber State to win a second straight Women’s Basketball Invitational Championship, 87-85.

Weber State had the ball and a chance to either tie or win the game in the final seconds, but the Wildcats were unable to execute a final shot.

UL, which has finished the last two postseasons 8-0, ended 2015-16 at 25-10. That ties a UL school record for most women’s basketball victories in a season.

For Weber State, the year finished 23-12 and established the winningest women’s season in school history and a first postseason tournament since 1982-83.

Despite having senior point guard Keke Veal out the game with five fouls after she scored 32 points and guard Jodi Quinn also benched with five fouls, most of the overtime was placed in the hands of their teammates, who Brodhead said performed admirably on the big stage.

“I thought our lineup that we had held it together and stepped up when they had to. It wasn’t so much our offense at the end that won the game for us. It was the stops that we were able to make,” he said.

One of those stops came on the game’s final play when Wildcats’ guard Deeshyra Thomas got the ball off an inbounds play after UL’s Sylvanan Okde sank the back end of a one-and-one, giving the Cajuns’ their final lead.

Weber State pushed it up the floor and after two passes, Thomas got the ball for the apparent last shot and moved toward the basket, but the Cajuns’ defense double teamed her, and Thomas was unable to get off an attempt.

Wildcats’ head women’s basketball coach Bethann Ord refused to speculate what went wrong on her team’s final play.

“We just didn’t execute what we wanted to do and the game just ended that way,” Ord said.

Ord said her team was hurt by the Wildcats’ 28 turnovers and the Cajuns’ prodigious rebounding. UL controlled the offensive boards 18-6 and held a slight overall advantage (38-32).

“Those two things really hurt us. The turnovers were one of those things where they were forced. That affected us as did the rebounding advantage of (UL),” Ord said.

The Cajuns scored 34 points off the turnovers, and the Wildcats managed 12 off UL’s lost possessions.

She said the Wildcats weren’t unnerved by the noise level in the gym.

“We’ve played three of our four tournament games on the road, so we’re used to it. It was loud, but it didn’t affect the way we played,” said Ord.

Brodhead gave the Wildcats credit for coming back to even the game at the end of regulation.

“You have to give (Weber State) credit for what they did. They found a way to take the lead away from us and make us guard them and foul them,” he said.

Veal, who was named the tournament’s MVP, had only nine points at halftime, but she came out of the intermission locker room with some moxie.

The senior from Opelousas scored nine more in the third period and then in the fourth quarter she helped the Cajuns to a 65-60 lead with 5:07 remaining.

Weber State initiated a 5-0 run during the final minute that cut a six-point Cajuns’ lead to a point (68-67). Then with 31 seconds left, Veal made a move with the ball in the frontcourt and officials whistled her for a charge that became a fifth fouled.

Before Veal’s final foul, Ord said, she told her team during a time out to double team Veal, whose final points came with 3:42 left.

“She’s a great player and I told our girls they had to start challenging her. I thought when we put the double team on her, that (Veal) seemed to struggle,” said Ord.

Veal said he came out in the second half with a purpose

“I knew that I was going to have to get after it and go get some points,” she said.

Regulation ended with the Cajuns failing to make a field goal for the final five minutes. The Wildcats tied the game when senior Brittany Dunbar put in a diving layup attempt that went in just before the buzzer.

In the first overtime, the Wildcats took a 76-73 advantage with 3:05 left when Jocelyn Adams put in a layup.

UL responded with a Kia Wilridge shot underneath .

The Cajuns turned the ball over with 3.9 second remaining and Weber State’s Kallie Quinn missed a trey right before the clock turned up zeroes.

Wilridge made a pair of field goals and the back end of one free throw to help the Cajuns to an 86-83 lead in the second overtime.

Thomas pushed the Wildcats within a point (86-85) after she made both free throws with 46.7 second lefts.