WVU Wins Thriller
February 26, 2003 10:10 PM | General
February 26, 2003
MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – Kate Bulger found her shooting touch Wednesday night. And because of that it looks like West Virginia has found itself in the Big East tournament.
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| West Virginia's Kate Bulger fires in two of her career-high 36 points to help West Virginia down Syracuse 77-74 in overtime. (All-Pro Photography/Dale Sparks) |
Bulger fired in a career-high 36 points including the game-winning three-point basket with four seconds left to give the Mountaineers to a critical 77-74 overtime win over Syracuse at the WVU Coliseum.
“It was a great game going down the stretch,” said West Virginia coach Mike Carey. “When we missed some shots Eartha White and Michelle Carter just battled. We got some looses balls and some tip-ins and needless to say Kate hit two big shots.”
West Virginia, now 15-10, 4-10, needed a victory to stay ahead of both Providence and St. John’s in the Big East standings. Coupled with Pitt’s loss at Notre Dame, West Virginia has now moved into a tie with Syracuse for 10th place in the league standings.
Syracuse had trouble all night guarding Bulger, who had 21 points by halftime.
Neither team had a lead bigger than four points in the first half, but West Virginia started the second half on a 13-5 run to take a nine-point lead after a layup by Carter with 12:55 to go. Syracuse battled back, getting WVU’s lead down to three at 53-50 and 57-54 before April Jean closed the gap to one on a driving layup with 6:55 to go.
Syracuse took its first lead of the second half with 1:31 left on a layup by Shannon Perry and led 64-62 with eight seconds remaining after a pair of free throws by Perry.
Then West Virginia’s Yolanda Paige took the basketball and went the length of the court, attracted three defenders in the lane, and dished off a pass inside to Eartha White for an easy layup right before the buzzer to tie the game at 64.
“I was nervous, but I knew if she got me the ball I was determined to win tonight and I did not want to lose the game because of me,” said White.
“She shot it from one of the hardest places on the court in the corner – that little short corner with no backboard,” said Bulger. “It was a tough shot; she made it under pressure, and that won the game for us right there.”
In the overtime, Syracuse had a two-point lead following a Rochelle Coleman three-point basket when a technical foul called on Syracuse’s April Jean under the West Virginia basket swung the momentum in West Virginia’s favor.
Bulger made both free throws to tie the game, and then nailed a big three-point basket with 49 seconds left to give the Mountaineers a 74-71 lead.
Coleman answered with a three of her own to tie the game at 74-all.
After a 30-second timeout, Page once again brought the ball into the heart of the Syracuse zone, drawing defenders away from Bulger on the wing and allowing her enough room to get off the game-winning shot.
“Yolanda created both of them,” said Bulger. “We’ve worked hard on setting picks and coming off picks. Another reason I got those open shots was because of Janell’s (Dunlap) picks and the post’s picks.”
“On that last-second play we ran it a couple of times before and they did a good job defending it and this time they didn’t,” added Carey.
Joining Bulger in the double-figure scoring column was White with 12 and Carter with 10. Carter pulled down 13 rebounds and White added 11.
Paige led West Virginia with a game-high 10 assists.
McBride and Coleman led Syracuse with 19 points each, Jean scored 15 and Perry added 14.
“It was a great game – they played hard and we played hard and we needed this,” said Carey. “If we were going to go to the Big East tournament we needed to win this game.”
Now, any combination of a West Virginia win or a Providence loss assures the Mountaineers a spot in the Big East tournament. Providence finishes the season with games against No. 1-ranked Connecticut and No. 17 Villanova.
The victory also assures West Virginia of its first winning season since going 19-12 in 1997.
“I think we’re finally putting things together,” said Bulger.
Carey points out that last year the circumstances were opposite for West Virginia.
“Last year we were running out of legs and were a little bit tired at this point,” he said. “Now this year I hate to lose a bunch of games and have them start playing well at the end, but we are playing better. We’re getting better spacing, we’re setting better picks, we’re playing better defense and we’re playing more intense. That’s the way you want to play at the end of the year.”
WVU has regular season games remaining at Virginia Tech Saturday and at Connecticut on Tuesday.
Syracuse, which drops to 9-16, 4-10, has home games left against Pitt and Notre Dame.
