NORTH CHARLESTON, S.C. — It was an early wake-up call for those of us that were here for the first game today, Day 3 of the Southern Conference women’s basketball tournament.
The College of Charleston and Georgia Southern tipped off at 9 a.m. and the Cougars came up with a 65-53 win, which was a bit of a surprise since Georgia Southern won both their regular-season games pretty easily.
Breakfast at the North Charleston Coliseum wasn’t much of a draw for fans, however. The Lady Mocs were on hand to see who they will face at noon Sunday in the first semifinal, and their presence accounted for about 10 percent of the crowd.
The pace of play late didn’t help the atmosphere, either. As Georgia Southern fouled at every opportunity to try to keep its season alive, the final 2:00 on the clock lasted more than 10 minutes in real time.
Not that the gentleman sitting to my right, some kind of tournament official I’m guessing since he had a walkie-talkie, noticed what was happening. Nope, he finally gave up on fighting the head-bob and just snoozed on press row for about 20 minutes.
The Lady Mocs, who beat Charleston 62-36 two weeks ago, were scheduled to practice at 2 p.m. before returning here to the arena to watch the UTC men’s team play Elon tonight at 7.
Charleston coach Nancy Wilson is one of the better quotes in the conference, and she had some pretty interesting comments after the game. Among them, she said for her team to win tomorrow the Cougars not only have to play pretty close to perfect, but UTC will have to be off its game a little, as well.
That sounds about right, but you don’t often hear a coach say something like that about a semifinal matchup.
UPDATE: Elon and Davidson are playing in the second game right now and the Phoenix, the No. 6 seed, are up 25-22 at the half over the No. 3 seed. Elon won its first two SoCon games this season and then dropped 11 straight before righting the ship and winning four of its last five.
UPDATE Part Deux: Elon pulls off the upset of the tournament so far, thumping Davison 68-49. The Phoenix had won just six conference games in the regular season, compared to Davidson’s 13 wins, but Elon outscored the Wildcats 29-12 over the final 11:25.
E-mail John Frierson at jfrierson@timesfreepress.com.
John Frierson is in his fifth year at the Times Free Press and fifth year covering University of Tennessee at Chattanooga athletics. The bulk of his time is spent covering Mocs football, but he also writes about women’s basketball and the big-picture issues and news involving the athletic department. A native of Athens, Ga., John grew up a few hundred yards from the University of Georgia campus. Instead of becoming a Bulldog he attended Ole ...
Or login with:
New Account