Wednesday, February 16, 2011

Wahoo! Virginia celebrates wins over N.C. State, Maryland


Going into last week's game at North Carolina State, the Virginia Cavaliers had a seven-game road losing streak.

Ariana Moorer made sure her team would not leave Raleigh with another road loss.

With time expired in the fourth overtime, the Virginia junior hit a jumper to help the Cavaliers pull off a 94-92 victory over the Wolfpack. It's the first four-overtime game for both programs.

Three days later, Moorer helped Virginia pick up their second straight road victory. She scored a game-high 17 points to lead the Cavaliers to a 60-57 upset over Maryland.

Virginia will not finish with a road winning season. The Cavaliers are 3-7 with one game remaining.

Still, the big wins over North Carolina State and Maryland increased Virginia's chances to not only clinch its seventh consecutive winning season, but to earn an NCAA tournament berth. The Cavaliers, who are hosting the first and second-round NCAA games on March 20 and 22, are 15-12 with three regular season games remaining.

After a week break, Virginia returns to the court on Sunday with a home game against Boston College. The Cavaliers also have Duke (Feb. 24) and Virginia Tech (Feb. 27) left on their regular season schedule.

A win against either of those teams will clinch the Cavaliers a winning season.

The Cavaliers started their season on Nov. 12 with a 82-66 road victory over Hofstra. Then, Virginia lost road games to Tennessee, Ohio State, James Madison, Florida State, Georgia Tech, North Carolina and Clemson.

Against North Carolina State, the Cavaliers came back from a four-point deficit with 1:55 left in the fourth overtime period to pick up the win. After N.C. State's Marissa Kastanek hit a 3-pointer to give the Wolfpack a 92-88 lead, Virginia came back with a layup and two free throws by China Crosby and the game-winning basket by Moorer.

"What do you say?" Virginia coach Debbie Ryan said on Virginiasports.com. "I was just really proud of the fight that we had tonight. We were up, we were down. We were in, we were out. We played with a lot of heart and so did N.C. State. They played a great game as well with a short number of people on their bench. I can't say enough about the players and the way they were resilient and sustained an effort over a long period of time tonight. We've played in a lot of close games this year and it was good to finally win one."

Against Maryland, Virginia came back from a three-point deficit with three minutes left in the game to pick up its second win over a ranked team this season.

"I thought they really took it to us on the defensive end," Maryland coach Brenda Frese said in the University of Maryland Diamondback on Monday. "They were physical. We stopped cutting hard, we would stop being aggressive. I thought they were the tougher team."

Big jump: With wins over Maryland and North Carolina last week, the Miami Hurricanes jumped seven spots to No. 13 in the polls, the biggest jump among the top 25 teams this week.

Miami's No. 13 ranking is the program's highest since 1992. The wins over Maryland and North Carolina marked the first time in program history the Hurricanes beat ranked teams in back-to-back games.

Miami takes a 22-3 record into Thursday's road game with Boston College.

Welcome aboard, Zags: Gonzaga is in the top 25 for the first time this season. The Bulldogs enter this week at No. 25.

Gonzaga beat Loyola Marymount and Pepperdine last week and will take a 22-4 record into Thursday's game with Santa Clara. The Bulldogs also play San Francisco on Saturday.

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