LEXINGTON, Ky. ? Despite a valiant comeback effort that brought Kentucky back from a 15-point second-half deficit, the Wildcats were unable to complete the rally, falling 69-64 Sunday in Memorial Coliseum in the quarterfinals of the Women?s National Invitation Tournament.
The Wildcats (17-16) were making their school-record fourth consecutive postseason appearance. Kentucky tallied 17 or more wins in each of the past four years and has advanced to at least the second round of a postseason tournament all four years. The Cats, who have participated in the WNIT three of the last four years with an NCAA Tournament appearance in 2005-06, have advanced to at least the third round in each of their last three WNIT appearances.
The game marked the final contest for UK?s senior class ? Chante? Bowman (Detroit), Chelsea Chowning (Berea, Ky.), Sarah Elliott (McKee, Ky.) and Samantha Mahoney (Detroit). The trio of Bowman, Elliott and Mahoney, who first set foot on the Kentucky campus prior to the 2004-05 season, led the Wildcats to one of the most successful four-year spans in program history, as UK went 77-55 (.583) over the past four seasons.
?You can look at the numbers and you can tell how much the program changed with this senior class,? UK head coach Matthew Mitchell said. ?I can remember recruiting them in high school and how much the attitude of this program has changed. The number that is most telling is the fact that in the four years before they got here, Kentucky won 41 games and, together, they won 77 games in four years. They really changed the attitude of this program and that?s the most special thing about them. That is hard to do in this league and, if we are able to continue our success, you can look back and point to this class as the one that got it going. Kentucky will forever be better because this class of seniors decided to come here.?
Mahoney led the Wildcats in scoring with a game-high 15 points. She made a career-high 11 free throws, going 11-of-15 from the free-throw line and dishing out four assists in 33 minutes of action. Her 11 free throws are a record for free throws by a UK player in a WNIT game in school history. She finishes her Kentucky career with 1,601 points, which ranks third-place all time in school annals. She surpassed Pam Browning, who scored 1,598 points from 1974-78.
?We came in together not really knowing what to expect,? Mahoney said of the senior class. ?We had a dream to build this program and we were able to do that. We have been through a lot together and we?ve done well. We all, as seniors in high school, looked at going to a program that had not had a lot of success as a great opportunity to help turnaround this program, and we?re really proud of what we have accomplished.?
Freshman forward Victoria Dunlap (Nashville, Tenn.) followed with 14 points and 10 rebounds for her second consecutive double-double and her third straight game with double-figure rebounds. Junior Eleia Roddy (Columbus, Ohio), who came in with the current senior class but redshirted due to injury, finished with nine points.
Elliott finished with four rebounds in the game to give her 800 for her career, as she becomes just the fourth player in school history to chart 800 or more career rebounds. She also finished with five blocks for the second consecutive game. Elliott is the school?s all-time career leader in blocked shots with 195 rejections and concludes her career ranking sixth on the career scoring list with 1,502 points. With five blocks in the game, Elliott set a new single-season record with 56. She eclipsed the previous record of 53 set by Valerie Still during the 1980-81 season. Elliott and Mahoney played in a school-record 132 career games.
Bowman, known for her defensive energy and intensity, finished her career with 105 starts and 408 career points. Chowning, who only played one season for UK while attending pharmacy school and earning the Southeastern Conference?s Scholar Athlete of the Year award, played in 32 games with 316 points.
Kentucky trailed Marquette (19-14) by 15 points, 53-38, with 11:48 remaining in the game before the Wildcats engineered a 12-0 run over the next 3:22 to come within three, 53-50, on a lay-up by junior point guard Carly Ormerod (Louisville, Ky.) Mahoney had five points during that scoring streak. A 6-2 run by the Golden Eagles moved them in front 59-52 with 6:44 left in the game. After the teams traded baskets, Mahoney nailed a pair of free throws to bring the Cats within three, 61-58, with 5:22 to go.
With UK trailing 65-58 with 4:05 left in the game, Roddy converted on a three-point play and Mahoney followed with a free throw to bring the Cats within three, 65-62, with 58 seconds left. With Marquette attempting to hold the ball and run time off the clock, Chowning forced the Golden Eagles? Krystal Ellis to turn the ball over with 35 ticks left. Chowning, however, threw the ball away and was forced to foul with 30.8 seconds remaining as the shot clock re-set due to a change of possession. Ellis nailed a pair of charity shots with 19 seconds left to ice the win for Marquette.
Ellis was unstoppable for the Golden Eagles, scoring a game-high 40 points with five three-pointers. Her 40 points are the most scored against UK by an opponent in WNIT history and come just five points shy of the WNIT individual scoring record of 45 points scored by Memphis? Tamika Whitmore on March 17, 1999. Ellis made 13-of-14 free throws in the game.
?We had more mental breakdowns in this game generally than we have had all season defensively,? Mitchell said. ?We had more of our players that weren?t very disciplined today. I don?t know if that was fatigue from the long season, if it was mental fatigue, I don?t know what it was, but we just broke down.?
The Wildcats shot 39.5 percent (19-of-48) from the floor in the game and were out-rebounded 38-36. Kentucky went to the free-throw line 35 times, their third-most free-throw attempts of the season, but made just 65.7 percent (23-of-35) of their shots from the stripe. Marquette shot 34.5 percent (20-of-58) from the field and scored 22 points off of 20 UK turnovers.
In his first year as Kentucky?s head coach, Mitchell led his team to a fourth-place finish in the SEC with an overall mark of 8-6. It marked the most league wins by a first-year head coach in school history. The Wildcats overcame injuries to key players (five different players missed a total of 50 games) and navigated their way through one of the nation?s toughest schedules. Along the way, the Cats earned three wins against nationally ranked opponents and 13 of UK?s 16 losses came against NCAA-bound teams.
Kentucky broke out to a 7-3 advantage at the 16:20 mark of the first half after back-to-back baskets by Bowman and Dunlap. The Golden Eagles then used a 6-3 run to come within one, 10-9, on a jumper by Angel Robinson with 13:08 to go in the first half. A basket by Dunlap and a pair of free throws put the Wildcats up by five, 14-9, before a three-pointer by sophomore Lydia Watkins (Hopkinsville, Ky.) with 10:10 remaining gave UK its biggest lead of the half at 17-11.
From there, Marquette held Kentucky scoreless over the next 3:17 and used a 9-0 run to go in front 20-17 after a three-pointer by Ellis at the 6:23 mark. The two teams traded leads before Ellis had five consecutive points to help the Golden Eagles extend their advantage to 29-23 with 4:06 left in the half. Dunlap single-handedly led a 4-0 run by the Wildcats to bring them as close as two, 29-27. Marquette closed out the half on a 7-4 run to take a 36-31 advantage into the locker room at intermission.
Kentucky shot 45.0 percent (9-of-20) from the floor in the opening period, but the Wildcats were out-rebounded 20-15 and committed 11 turnovers that resulted in 10 Marquette points. The Golden Eagles shot 37.5 percent (12-of-32) from the field in the first half.
Out of halftime, Mahoney hit three free throws to bring the Cats within two, 36-34, with 17:25 remaining, but the Golden Eagles used a 7-2 run over the next two minutes to push their advantage out to seven, 43-36. Marquette led by as many as 15 points (53-38) after a three-pointer by Ellis at the 11:48 mark, but that was when the Wildcats began chipping away at their deficit.
Marquette advances to face the winner of the Colorado-TCU game in the WNIT semifinals at a date and time to be determined later.
