Buckeye513
Stable Genius
Purdue's up 53-22 on Indiana right now.
Looks like the Ladies will get another shot at the Boilers.
Looks like the Ladies will get another shot at the Boilers.
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Buckeye women in final
Monday, March 6, 2006
[FONT=Verdana, Times New Roman, arial, helvetica, sans-serif]By MICHAEL MAROT AP Sports Writer[/FONT]
INDIANAPOLIS - Ohio State showed it can improvise when needed.
With two-time Big Ten player of the year Jessica Davenport frustrated by the Michigan State defense, the Buckeyes changed strategy without a hitch Sunday.
Debbie Merrill scored 7 of her 15 points in a critical late flurry to give the No. 5 Buckeyes the lead for good, and the conference’s regular-season champs fended off No. 16 Michigan State, 68-64, in the tourney semifinals.
“Jessica is such a great player and draws so much attention, I was just wide open underneath and I just laid it up,” Merrill said.
Ohio State won its 18th straight and reached its first tourney title game since 2003. It faces No. 14 Purdue, a 61-47 winner over rival Indiana in the other semifinal, tonight. It’s only the third time in tourney history that the top two seeds made it to the finals.
With Davenport struggling to get open against the swarming Spartans — once throwing an elbow at a Michigan State player — the Buckeyes relied on others to do the dirty work.
Merrill, who was in foul trouble much of the first half, was the primary option. Brandie Hoskins and Marscilla Packer, whose outside shooting and hard drives gave Ohio State a more balanced attack, provided more help.
Hoskins and Packer each finished with 15 points, while Davenport managed 10 points and 14 rebounds.
It was exactly the way fourth-seeded Michigan State wanted to play, just not the result they’d expected.
The Spartans (22-9) were led by Liz Shimek with 23 points and six rebounds while Lindsay Bowen added 11 points. But it wasn’t quite enough for Michigan State to defend last year’s tournament title. Michigan State even had a shot at the end by hitting back-to-back 3-pointers to close within 65-64 but called a timeout it did not have to stop the clock with 1 second left. Ohio State then closed it out by making 3-of-4 free throws.
OHIO STATE 68 | MICHIGAN STATE 64
OSU muscles into Big Ten final vs. Purdue
Monday, March 06, 2006
Jim Massie
THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH
</IMG> MIKE MUNDEN | DISPATCH Stephanie Blanton, left, and Tia Battle react to Ohio State free throws late in the game.
INDIANAPOLIS — Slumped on a stool in a Conseco Fieldhouse locker room yesterday afternoon, Ohio State senior point guard Ashley Allen had the look of someone who had just plowed the back 40 acres without a tractor or mule.
"I’m just tired," Allen said. "That was rough. Those last 10 seconds were a lifetime, as usual against Michigan State."
The top-seeded Buckeyes had good reason to look as weary as they felt after 40 bruising minutes that resulted in a 68-64 win over fourth-seeded Michigan State in the semifinals of the Big Ten tournament.
The third meeting between the two conference powerhouses wasn’t at all charming. It was a physical slugfest from the opening tip to the final buzzer.
OSU senior forward Debbie Merrill predicted that kind of rugby scrum less than 24 hours earlier.
"That game was exactly how I thought it was going to be," said Merrill, who scored nine of her 15 points in the final 7:36. "It was very physical. Even when we got up, Michigan State is a great team. They just kept fighting.
"It was a fun game. I’m just happy we came out top."
The Buckeyes (27-2) now face second-seeded Purdue (24-5) at 7 tonight with a chance to win the tournament for the first time.
To reach the final, OSU withstood a furious closing run by the Spartans (22-9) that included three, three-point baskets in the final 52 seconds.
Two of those came from Courtney Davidson in the final 6.6 seconds.
The Buckeyes shrugged off the threat by converting 11 of 12 free throws down the stretch. Marscilla Packer made two with one second remaining after the Michigan State bench was assessed a technical foul for calling a timeout it didn’t have. Packer was 6 for 6 from the line and matched Merrill and Brandie Hoskins with 15 points. She was looking to handle the basketball late in the game with the Spartans forced to foul.
"You just make harder cuts and see how the defense is playing you," Packer said. "And you just know that you have to get open. I was just focusing on that. I don’t think I relaxed until there was one second left on the clock. I knew they couldn’t win the game on one possession."
OSU coach Jim Foster thought that his team won because the players eventually adjusted to the physical style of play.
"Liz Shimek is as strong as any player we play against," he said. "They were moving people. I thought our kids pulled up their shorts and did what they needed to do in the second half. That’s an important dimension to have at this time of the year. You’ve got to adjust yourself to the situation at hand. You can either whine about it or pull your shorts up and do something about it."
The Buckeyes, who have won 18 consecutive games, had two X-factors when it mattered. With the Spartans double- and triple-teaming Jessica Davenport on the block, Merrill became more aggressive offensively late in the game.
Davenport, meanwhile, concentrated on rebounding and defense. She finished with 10 points and 14 boards and tied a tournament record with six blocked shots. She altered at least as many attempts and was a major reason Michigan State shot 34.8 percent from the field.
"My ability in shot blocking and Debbie’s ability to take charges, I think it really made them think twice about coming into the paint," said Davenport, who now has the tournament record with 19 career blocks. "I think our guards did a good job of making sure their three-point shooters did get a lot of shots."
Shimek led the Spartans with 23 points. A three-pointer by Lindsay Bowen tied the score at 49 with 5:17 to play. Merrill answered with a three-point play. Packer then hit a trey, and Merrill added two free throws to stretch the lead to 57-51.
A breakaway basket by Hoskins with 45 seconds remaining pushed the advantage to 61-56. From there, the Buckeyes held on because they did what they had to do from free-throw line.
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Monday, March 06, 2006
#3 LSU and #4 Maryland both lost tonight. OSU should move up to the number 3 spot with a win over Purdue!
The Lady Buckeyes moved up to #2 this week.
AP Top 25
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Associated Press Top 25
No. School Record Points Prev
1 North Carolina 29-1 1125 1
2 Ohio State 27-2 1000 5
3 Maryland 28-4 996 4
4 Duke 26-3 977 2
5 LSU 27-3 938 3
6 Rutgers 25-3 934 6
7 Tennessee 28-4 901 8
8 Oklahoma 26-4 819 9
9 Connecticut 27-4 804 7
10 Baylor 22-5 713 10
11 Stanford 23-6 630 13
12 Purdue 24-5 593 14
13 DePaul 25-5 574 15
14 Georgia 21-8 559 12
15 Arizona State 24-6 494 11
16 Michigan State 22-9 460 16
17 Louisiana Tech Lady Techsters 23-4 339 19
18 Temple 23-7 243 22
19 Utah 21-6 242 17
20 BYU Cougars 23-4 227 18
21 New Mexico 21-8 211 21
22 Texas A&M 22-7 194 25
23 Minnesota 19-9 105 20
24 Bowling Green 25-2 101 _
25 Vanderbilt 20-10 82 23
Others Receiving Votes: Florida 60, George Washington 54, UCLA 52, Kentucky 30, Tulsa 27, Boston College 20, N.C. State 19, St. John's 19, Chattanooga 16, Florida St. 15, W. Kentucky 15, Indiana St. 12, Wyoming 10, Missouri 6, Virginia Tech 6, Virginia 2, Hartford 1.
Updated: (03/06/2006) at 15:34 EST