KATY, Texas — In Friday's Southland Conference Tournament quarterfinal blowout of Central Arkansas, the ACU Wildcats proved they could win a game by burying a team under a barrage of 3-pointers.
Saturday afternoon at the Merrell Center, they proved they could stand up to the bully on the block, take a punch, get up, land a few haymakers of their own and walk away with an out-of-nowehere victory. Simply put, it was one of the gutsiest performances and best wins by any team in any sport in ACU Athletics history.
The Wildcats withstood the challenge posed by one of the nation's top defensive teams as they scored 36 fourth-quarter points to pull off a stunning 88-79 upset of Lamar, which entered the tournament as the top seed for the third time in the last six years. In five of those six seasons, the Cardinals have come to Katy with the double-bye into the semifinals and they are now 0-5 in semifinal games.
ACU, meanwhile, improves to 22-9 after entering the tournament as the No. 4 seed and will play for the conference championship and a berth in the NCAA Tournament at 1 p.m. Sunday against No. 6 seed Texas A&M-Corpus Christi, which upset No. 2 seed Stephen F. Austin, 58-56, in the game after ACU's win over Lamar.
Junior guard
Breanna Wright put together an incredible effort, scoring 29 of her team-high 31 points in the second half as she set conference tournament records for free throws made (16) and percentage (1.000) as she went 16 for 16 from the line. ACU, in fact, tied its own single-game Division I-era record for made free throws (28) as the Wildcats went 28 for 30 from the line, including an incredible display in the fourth quarter when they were 20 for 20.
One day after setting conference tournament single-game records for 3-pointers made (16) and attempted (35), the Wildcats came within an eyelash of setting the single-game record for shooting percentage, hitting 61.9 percent of their shots (26 of 42), falling just .04 short of the record of 62.3 percent set by Corpus Christi in a 2008 game vs. Texas State.
Four Wildcats finished in double figures as
Lexie Ducat (15 points),
Sara Williamson (14) and
Makayla Mabry (13) joined Wright in double figures. The Wildcats out-rebounded the Cardinals, 32-29, and after giving up 14 first-half offensive rebounds that led to 16 second-chance points, the Wildcats limited Lamar to just one offensive rebound and four second-chance points in the final 20 minutes.
"I'm so proud of this team and to be the coach of the first ACU women's basketball team to play for a Southland Conference championship," ACU head coach
Julie Goodenough said. "The players really trusted in what we asked them to do. They believed going into the fourth quarter we had a chance to win the game."
While the Wildcats were hitting their free throws, the Cardinals faltered at the charity stripe, missing five of their eight attempts in the fourth.
ACU survived the 14 steals recorded by Lamar (24-6), which had come into the game having won seven straight and 19 of their last 20 games. While the league's Player of the Year and Defensive Player of the Year Chastadie Barrs recorded four swipes, she was unable to get going offensively, scoring just 10 points on 4-for-12 shooting before fouling out late in the fourth quarter.
All-conference first-teamer Moe Kinard kept the Cardinals in the contest, scoring a game-high 34 points to go along with seven rebounds and five steals.
For much of the game, it appeared the Cardinals – who led by as much as 11 -- were on the verge of breaking the game open, but the Wildcats rallied with a run to get back into the contest.
Lamar appeared set to pull away after Kinard's jumper gave them a 55-46 lead with 2:57 left in the third quarter, but ACU was revived by run that was highlighted by Ducat's layup that helped close to within 56-52 in the closing seconds of the quarter before a pair of free throws from Crump gave the Cards a 58-52 cushion entering the fourth.
Barrs drew her fourth foul with 8:50 left in the fourth, which gave the Wildcats the opening they needed to draw closer, which they achieved when consecutive treys from
Makayla Mabry and Wright brought ACU within one at 68-67 at the 4:24 mark of regulation. ACU also took advantage of shaky free-throw shooting from Lamar, which missed three of their first six shots in the fourth from the charity stripe.
Jadyn Pimentel's fifth foul led to Wright's two free throws that gave ACU a 69-68 lead with 3:52 remaining, their first lead since the first quarter. Umaja Collins' short jumper regained the lead for Lamar, but Wright returned to the line to hit two more free throws to give the Wildcats a 71-70 lead with 3:15 left.
After Williamson's basket extended the lead to 75-70, Wright added a steal that resulted in Mabry's three-pointer that proved to be the backbreaker at 78-70 with 1:14 remaining. A
Madi Miller steal set Wright up for a layup that made it 80-70 with 47 seconds on the clock.
From there, the Wildcats' task was to hit their free throws, which they did as Wright (4 for 4), Williamson (2 for 2) and Mabry (2 for 2) slammed the door on the Cardinals in the final 27 seconds.
"Words are hard to come by to express how I feel after that game,"Wright said. "We knew we'd have to handle their pressure because Lamar always plays with a lot of energy and emotion. But we just believe in each other. When we were down, our coaches and players on the bench were telling to just keep chipping away at the lead and that's what we were able to do. We made some adjustments to their pressure in the second half and got more people moving in the backcourt, and we did a much better job rebounding the basketball. But we just believed. I wanted to win this game, no matter what … we all did. That was our mindset coming into it, and it showed in the way we played, especially in the fourth quarter."
