Lady Cards Falter 78-74

Despite 35 points and 13 rebounds from Angel McCoughtry and 17 points and 20 rebounds from Candyce Bingham, the
Lady Cards were ousted from the NCAA Women’s Tournament by the Tar Heels.

Lady Cards Run Afoul of North Carolina

By Sonja

Using a strong inside performance in the second half, and receiving a nice assist from the officials, the UNC TarHeels take down the Cards this afternoon in New Orleans.

Louisville gave UNC all the wanted in the first half. Up 21-13 at the 13:06 mark, the went on a 16-6 run to lead the TarHeels 37-19 after a Chauntise Wright three-point play with 6:31 to go. From that point on, though the Heels,who
had gone 1-17 at one point from the field, found their shooting eye and went on a 18-9 run to close the half and trail by only nine at the break.

UNC’s good fortunes continued in the second half. An 11-1 run cut the lead to one with 15:59 to go. The Heels didn’t actually grab the lead until the 8:40 mark, and using a 11-0 run, had the Cards in the hole 64-57 with 6:59 left.

At that point, Louisville had big troubles. Hines, McCoughtry and Wright all with four fouls. zero points from the bench. It looked over, but Louisville kept battling.

With 2:27 left and UNC up by 10, the Cards tried one last rally. A McCoughtry free throw and layup cut it to seven. A Candyce Bingham three sliced it to our … and with 1:38 to go, it was a four-point game. The Cards cut it to two after another Bingham three with 31 seconds to go, but would not score again and the Heels pulled out a hard-fought four-point advantage.

Angel McCoughtry left it all out there, with 35 points. Candyce Bingham kept pulling the Cards back into it with clutch 3 pointers, but it just wasn’t enough.

Sometimes, good teams lose to great teams…and UNC is a great team. They didn’t get flustered when they were down by almost 20….and they used a withering 1-3-1 zone and an offensive full out attack in the paint to climb back into it.

So, the season ends for the Lady Cards. A magical season … an impressive debut for Jeff Walz. We’ll do a full season recap of this magical trip in a few days…but for now…it’s time to just reflect on what could have been, and hope our guys can get revenge tonight. Crying about referees never accomplishes anything, but one has to wonder how this one could have turned out if the Cards would have received equal representation at the foul line.

It’s been fun, I’ve had some great and interesting dialogue with several of you….and I’m already looking forward to next year. Let’s smile about what we did accomplish this year…and get behund T-Will and the gang with all the spirit and energy we have left.