Taylor Soule admitted that she had taken down a game.
Four minutes remained in the Boston College WNIT First Round matchup against Maine, but the Black Bears’ hopes of setting up a No. 1 seed were quickly dashed in the Chestnut Hill night. They had cut the Eagles’ 20-point lead and brought the game back to 15, but a 90-second stagnation in the insults of both teams erased all dreams of getting past the first round. All that was left was a final stamp, and the Pillars, looking from their defensive position, knew it was happening.
It was off Marnelle Garraud, the assistant maker on a dagger three-drawing seconds ago. She drew Maine’s Alba Orois on a defensive tackle and forced a foul, but as the ball bounced to the sideline, the Sprint senior grabbed it as it thundered outside boundaries. Soule thought it was going to be a whistle, but as the ball caught the Conte Forum air, she instead took the waiting hands of Cameron Swartz streak toward the basket for an uncontested layout.
BBC Bank explodes with joy. The lead was back to 19 points, and after another claw and quick break, Maine replaced its senior leader before conceding a 69-44 loss to the better, more powerful, top-seeded Eagles.
“I stopped playing,” Soule said. “From my angle I saw Marnelle, and I thought to come back to the defense. Then all of a sudden everything just slowed down. The bench [exploded], and I was glad that there was no turnover. We like to rest like that. That was a good game. “
Playing in each postseason tournament offers a different dynamic of each situation during the regular season or conference tournament. The margin for error evaporates as the teams no longer move to an imaginary position alongside an invisible bubble conversation jockey. Goals simplify how coaching instructs players as one concludes another season.
It’s probably the hardest thing to do, and BC came in on Thursday after running an emotional rampage. More than two weeks have passed since the last game of the Eagles, and the loss against Florida State in the ACC tournament hangs as a bad shot as other conference tournaments have produced bubble dreams and automatic bids. The Eagles still believed they would dance in the NCAA Tournament, but the liquidation decision of the selection committee left them in favor of the same Seminoles they had beaten over a week earlier.
The Eagles were left as the first team out of the NCAA Tournament, and questions remained as to how they would respond in the first round of a single elimination tournament. Playing as Top Som bore its own mark of pressure, and Maine, the America East’s regular season champion, did not enter BC as a token opponent after the WNIT offered relief and comfort after its conference tournament loss in Albany.
“Maine was a postseason team year-in-year-out,” head coach Joanna Bernabei-McNamee said. “This was also their shot. They were just as heartbroken as we were because they beat Albany twice in the season and lost the America’s East Championship. [in their last game], and we were heartbreaking because we really thought we should be an NCAA team. We both had a bit of heartache in this match, but it showed a lot of both teams that we would put on our big girl pants, put a chip on our shoulders and show that we would play as hard as we could. “
“It was an emotional week,” said Soule, “but whether it’s life or basketball, you can not stay in the past. If you’re in a situation, you have to make the best of it. So now our goal is to win a championship. won, and that was an important one [game]”.
Maine started the game with their hair on fire and ran on a two-point lead over the clearly defeated Eagles in the first quarter, but BC’s rally in the second slammed the door on one of those hopes after beating the. Black Bears have exceeded. a 22-7 margin. A team that struggled with its rebounding in the first quarter was awakened in the second, and a defense that allowed 18 points in the first allowed its opponent to hold on to 3-of-17 shots while the offensive remained warm.
“We got into a bit of full court pressure, which really unleashed the energy and got us going,” Bernabei-McNamee said. “Then we went back to a half court zone and removed the back doors they got in the first quarter. They are well controlled. [on the back-end] and well-cooked to get that cut and come out of both backdoor and pick-and-rolls. I think the zones took a bit away from them and allowed us to get into the passing lanes to do what we do without going behind the back door. It allowed us to be aggressive by pushing and then coming to an extended defense of a half court.
The effort cleared both of Maine’s top scorers, Maeve Carroll and Anne Simon, and even though the combination raised half of Black Bear’s offensive points, not much else fell outside of Caroline Bornemann’s 18 points. Only two other players – Orois and Adrianna Smith – scored points, but their individual field goals did not help much in a night where their team shot below 30 percent of the field with just three free-kicks.
BC, meanwhile, used their defense to anchor three-quarters of the offensive line. The Eagles never went below 50 percent and finished with 21 points from Soule, adding five rebounds and three assists. Maria Gakdeng adding 13 points and four rebounds in the middle meanwhile Kaylah Ivey took command of the attack and matured in a 10-point, two-assist game.
“There is no one in the open court who sees the next pass better,” Bernabei-McNamee said. “Her coordination is impeccable, and where she really grows her game is in that stack overall aspect. The last few days in practice, she was a maniac talking and really controlling what we do in practice. She was a spark in the lead. ., and she plays to the best of her ability, she puts a lot of time into her game, she shows every day that she has a great shot, and she plays with that confidence. “
“It was basically just leaving the game with me,” Ivey replied, “and playing with a lot of confidence. There are things that I’ve been working on since the first year that I’m still working on consistently, but let the game go.come to me allow me to be patient and do everything to help my team.
Beat Maine deserves BC’s first postseason victory since a WNIT Second Round victory over St. Louis. They have not been eliminated in the first round since a 2002 upset loss to Mississippi State in the NCAA Tournament and have defeated an America East team for the third time in four overall appearances at the WNIT.
They now meet the winner of the Rhode Island-Quinnipiac game on Friday with a chance to advance to the Regional Semi-Finals for the first time since their last postseason appearance in 2011. Neither team played BC during this season, but the Rams beat the Eagles in 2019-2020 with BC winning, 66-55.
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