Box Score
UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. - The No. 6 seed University of Dayton women's basketball team (23-8) saw its season end with an 83-69 loss to No. 11 seed Florida (20-12) in the 2014 NCAA First Round.
Junior
Andrea Hoover led all scorers with 22 points, and also had four rebounds, four steals and two assists for the Flyers. Freshman
Celeste Edwards scored 15 points to go along with her team-high four assists. Sophomore
Amber Deane added 14 points, three assists and three steals. Junior
Ally Malott put up 12 points, a game-high three blocked shots and two assists.Â
The Gators outrebounded the Flyers 41-26, including 24-10 in the second half. Â Florida also had 15 offensive rebounds, to Dayton's five. Florida led on points in the paint (46-32), second chance points (15-6) and bench points (10-3).
The Flyers held a 32-29 lead at the half and came out strong from the break. UD led by as many as 12 points with 15:12 to play in the game after opening the second half, outscoring Florida 16-7.
Florida took its first lead of the second half with 8:52 to play on a Kayla Lewis layup that put the Gators up 57-56. Dayton never led in the contest again. Edwards scored the Flyers' last seven points, but Florida was solid from the free throw line down the stretch, knocking down 6-of-6 in the final 50 seconds.Â
Florida had five players score in double figures, led by Cassie Peoples with 21 points and six assists.Â
2014 NCAA DIVISION I WOMEN'S BASKETBALL CHAMPIONSHIP
First Round • Dayton vs. FloridaÂ
Bryce Jordan Center • University Park, Pa.
Sunday, March 23
POST-GAME NOTES
Florida Notes:
- No. 11 seed Florida (20-12) advances to the NCAA Second Round vs. No. 3 Penn State, Tuesday at 7:00 p.m. in the Bryce Jordan Center.
- Making their 14th NCAA Championship appearance, the Gators improved to 12-13 in all NCAA games, with a 9-5 record in First Round games.Â
- The Gators advance to the NCAA Second Round for the ninth time in program history with their 20th win of the season, marking UF's 14th 20-win season in program history.
- No. 11 is the lowest seed the Gators have had when winning an NCAA Tournament game. The previous lowest seed when posting a win was No. 9 in 2012, over No. 8 Ohio State.
- Trailing Dayton, 54-45 with 11:53 to play, the Gators finished the game on a 38-15 run.
- Florida had five players in double figures and improved to 6-0 this season when at least five players scored in double figures.
- Florida and Dayton met for just the second time, with the Gators winning, 97-93, in the 2000 WNIT.
Dayton Notes:
- No. 6 seed Dayton ends the season with a 23-8 record.
- Dayton fell to 2-5 in NCAA Championship games. The Flyers also advanced to the Second Round in 2010 and 2013.
- In the 2011 NCAA Tournament, No. 11 seed Dayton fell at No. 6 seed Penn State, 75-66.
- No. 6 Dayton earned its highest seeding in its NCAA Championship history.
- Dayton played in its fifth consecutive NCAA Championship, earning its first-ever NCAA berth in 2010 to begin the five-year run.
- Junior
Andrea Hoover scored 22 points, posting her 17th career game with 20+ points; 13th this season
- Sophomore
Amber Deane scored in double figures in 21 of 29 games played this seasonÂ
- Dayton was 17-3 this season when leading at the half.Â
- After starting the season 2-4, the Flyers went 21-3 since a Dec. 5 loss to Central Michigan to earn an NCAA at-large berth.
POST-GAME QUOTES
Opening Statement
I want to congratulate Florida. They played a heck of a game and I'm very disappointed about that five-to-six minute span in the second half that defined the end of our season. We've had trouble all year playing consistently tough in stretches and it did us really hard today at a really inopportune time.
Q: How disappointing is it to see the season come to an end when, like you said yesterday, you guys are trying to take that step to get to the second round?
A: I know we all worked hard for the sixth seed and we felt that if we played assertively and passionately on both ends that we'd have a fair shot at winning the game and for a lot of the game it looked like that and then - we can't be fair weathered. When things start to go wrong and we make some mistakes, we don't have that intestinal fortitude to fight through it. Florida - if you look at just the rebounding difference, you look at our size versus them and then you look at the difference - we got beat on the boards. That tells you everything you want to know and that's something we have to address. Florida is a very talented team, but they play with a lot of passion and they wanted this game very, very badly. I think our guys wanted it but when push comes to shove we have to learn how to fight through situations that we found ourselves in today. This is something that happened at Fordham in our championship game in the conference. It happened again, and I thought we kind of got through it. The first three quarters of the game it looked like we were in control and we were playing pretty well and then we hit a bump and we lost our composure. That's on me - I need to figure out how to fix that because we're not going to go to the second weekend if I can't fix that, so we have to find a way.
Q: On the defensive end, is there anything you saw that you guys could have changed when they started to attack the basket? What made them so effective and you guys not being able to adjust when they started to attack?
A: Our plan was to commit and then once I realized they were playing four guards and they were a lot quicker than they looked on film, I didn't feel comfortable that we could play man against them. I thought it would be worse if we tried playing man and I thought for a while that the zone looked good. I think again it comes back to a matter of toughness and being able to keep that guy in front of you and we haven't played any zone two, three all year so maybe that inexperience hurt us as well. We didn't adjust. We didn't close gaps when they drove. We stepped up at the wrong time. The forward didn't help the center. It was a lot of little things, but I think it comes back to their guy has the ball, throws a fake, drives the lane, and our guy is not there to take them on. It's just not good enough. We gave them wide-open lanes and that's not acceptable.
Q: With the younger team that you have, do you think the inexperience contributed to it at all? Do you think this experience will help these players as they come back for future NCAA appearances?
A: I'm never the one to talk about our inexperience and use it as an excuse and I'm not going to start now. We have to get tougher and better. You hope that every experience you have makes you better. If you're going to make mistakes, it should be used in a positive manner to improve and the mistakes are fine as long as you get better. This is two games in a row where we've made the same errors so, yes, we are young but I don't care. We were up nine and we're young and then we're down and we're young and then we lose and we're young. If we were good enough to be up nine then we should be good enough to maintain. We have to figure out a lot of stuff. But I want to credit Florida. I think they are a very well-coached team and I was very impressed with what they did to us today.
Q: Offensively you guys came out strong in the second half. You built that nine-point lead. What changed there in the final 12 minutes when Florida started making their run?
A: I think we kind of went away from what we were doing so well, which was driving to the basket and getting to the free throw line, and really forcing plays in the paint. I think we started to settle for jump shots, which we were taking bad shots in the transition offense. So, I think that's what really contributed to that little run they had.
A: I definitely agree. We started to get a little bit stagnant, a little bit passive. Like you said, we were so assertive coming out of halftime, and we just got away from our game and we started letting Florida take control instead of being in control like we were in the first place.
Q: Did your offense affect your defense when they started to attack the basket more, when they went on that run over four minutes and they started to erase your lead? Did you defense kind of suffer then from the offense?
A: Yeah, our transition defense kind of went away there for a little bit, and that's when they really started to attack the basket and we were really having a hard time containing their guards. They were getting to the paint and really creating for their post players and we've had this happen in the past and we just can't have that happen. We have to be a tougher team and we can't keep making the same mistakes over and over again or we won't get far.
Q: Did your offense affect your defense when they started to attack the basket more, when they run on that run over four minutes, and they started to erase your lead? Did you defense kind of suffer then from the offense?
A: We definitely got away from defensive assertiveness just like on offense. There was a lot of miscommunication, and their guards just took it to us and we kind of backed down and let them control the tempo and the game.
LOCKER ROOM QUOTES - Dayton
Q: Can you describe the factors that led to the game getting away from your team late in the second half?
A: I mean, they killed us on the boards and that's really hard to come back from. They went on a run and we just couldn't answer. We were missing some shots and Ally and I both got into foul trouble, so it just kind of killed the momentum a little bit. They got the better of us today.
Q: Coming into this game you had said that you expected Florida to be a physical team. Did that pan out the way you had envisioned?
A: Yeah. They were definitely a really physical team and they just drove it into us and got our posts into foul trouble really early. We just didn't answer as best as we could today and they capitalized.
Q: What do you think your team did well today, especially in the first half?
A: In the first half, I thought we were really attacking the basket well. We were crashing the boards just trying to keep the ball alive and attacked from the inside out. Second half we kind of got away from that and starting jacking up threes and they weren't hitting.
Q: The game got away from your team in the second half... what do you think led to that?
A: Well, we came out really strong and we were assertive and aggressive and we kind of controlled the game and once we got away from that, they just took over and started playing their game. We took bad shots and we were stagnant on offense and they got a lot of run outs and transitions and they got their confidence going. Once they had that, they just took over the game.
Q: What can you say about the physicality of Florida's team?
A: We knew going in that they were going to be really physical with us. Size-wise, we are a lot bigger than them so we could've taken advantage of that, but they were so tough mentally and physically. They pushed us around and, like I said, they took control of the game in every way they could.
