Eagles escape ouster
Eastern Michigan comes up short
COLUMBUS, Ohio -- It shouldn't have been a nail-biter when the No. 3 seed Boston College women's basketball team took on No. 14 Eastern Michigan in the first round of the Mideast Regional in the NCAA Tournament yesterday.
But that's what it turned into, as BC hit its first nine shots then saw its dominance dissipate as Eastern Michigan came back to tie it with 40 seconds to go. But a layup by Boston College center Kathrin Ress, followed by a missed 3-pointer by Eastern Michigan's Ryan Coleman allowed BC fans to quit chewing their nails.
The Eagles (26-6) defeated Eastern Michigan, 58-56, to advance to the second round tomorrow night against No. 6 seed Ohio State. The Buckeyes (21-9) defeated No. 11 seed West Virginia, 73-67, in the other first-round game here yesterday.
BC started out white-hot, hitting nine straight shots while building a 22-4 lead. But then the Eagles got too confident, too sloppy, or maybe a little of both as Eastern Michigan came storming back with a 13-2 run to cut the deficit to 7, 24-17, with 9:11 left in the first half.
And Eastern Michigan wasn't done. The team was down by 10 at the half, 34-24, but kept battering away at BC, which cooled off to shoot just 29 percent from the floor in the second half after shooting 51.7 percent in the first half. Eastern Michigan got within 5, then 3, then 1, at 51-50, with 4:49 left, and the crowd of 8,159 at St. John Arena smelled an upset. Eastern Michigan tied it for the first time, 56-56, on a layup by Nikki Knapp, but a layup by Ress put BC back up, 58-56, with 12 seconds left.
Eastern Michigan got one last chance. Coleman, a junior who led the team with 15 points, took a shot from behind the arc, but the shot was off the mark, allowing the clock to run out and sending BC into the second round.
Despite squandering double-digit leads in each half, BC coach Cathy Inglese and the players said the victory wasn't in doubt. Inglese did concede that she knew the team's hot start wouldn't last. "We've done that before, we've gone way up, then we started missing a little bit," Inglese said. "I think they took us out of our tempo. But there were 35 minutes left in the game, and there's no way I thought that would continue."
Amber Jacobs said the team just "had to play through" the slump.
"They're a scrappy team and had a lot of hustle," she said. "But with a 14 seed playing a 3 seed, they had nothing to lose."
"I think we were just too confident at the beginning," said Ress, who had a team-high 16 points.
Jacobs had 13 points, and Clare Droesch had 11 points and 11 rebounds, with 5 assists.
Junior guard Jessalyn Deveny said she felt the game was a good start to the tournament.
"We're just getting our feet wet here," she said. "They played a very solid game and gave us a good run, but we were very confident."
In the earlier game, West Virginia (21-11) hit five 3-pointers in the first half, but Ohio State went on a 7-0 run at the end to earn a 38-38 tie at intermission.
The Mountaineers, led by Kate Bulger's 18 points, refused to go down easily, and tied it, 47-47, on a jumper by Yolanda Paige (13 points) with 14 minutes left in the game. But Ohio State pulled away on a layup and free throw by freshman center Jessica Davenport, who had a game-high 22 points. 