Boston College
North Carolina State
Women's Basketball Completes Regular Season with Victory
March 01, 2009 | Women's Basketball
March 1, 2009
Chestnut Hill, Mass. - The Boston College women's basketball team (19-10, 7-7 ACC) completed its regular season on a high note at home, topping NC State (13-16, 5-9) Sunday afternoon by a score of 58-52.
The Eagles were led by sophomores Carolyn Swords and Stefanie Murphy and junior Mickel Picco. The three top-performers scored 43 of the team's 58 points. Picco was a perfect 4-4 from three-point range, scoring a total 14 points. Murphy shot 6-12 from the field for a team-high 15 points. She also added eight rebounds. Swords made five of her seven shots for 14 points and led the team with nine rebounds.
Defense ruled the first half for both teams as the Eagles went into the locker room with a 28-25 halftime advantage. Leading the way for BC were Murphy and Swords, who combined for a total of 16 points with a 7-10 shooting effort. Swords also brought down six rebounds and Murphy added five boards. BC saw their largest lead of eight points at 15:34. NC State battled back to gain z one point advantage at 9:04. The score flip-flopped the rest of the half. In all, there were a total of five lead changes and four tie scores.
The Eagles shot 55 percent in first while NC State shot 32 percent. BC also topped the Wolfpack on the boards 20-11. NC State's Shayla Fields led all scorers at the half with seven points.
The score was tied 33-33 with 15:38 before Picco notched her third and fourth three-point shots, giving the Eagles a three-point lead. After BC gained a seven-point advantage, NC State climbed back within three points, tallying the score at 47-44 with 8:04 to go in the game. Swords brought down a milestone 500th-career rebound with 5:57 left, her seventh of the game. Murphy then scored her team-leading sixth basket at 2:57, giving the Eagles their largest lead of the half. BC played stellar defense the rest of the game, finishing with four-consecutive free-throws from Picco and senior Victoria Jones to mark a 58-52 final in front of a 3,208 home crowd.
Jones shined on Senior Day with a team-leading five assists, a season high. Boston College finished the game shooting 51.2 percent from the field and tallied 37 rebounds. NC State finished with a 29 percent field goal effort and marked 29 rebounds. They had three players tally double-digit performances with Fields earning 14 points for the team-high.
Game Notes
After completing the regular season with a 7-7 conference record, the Eagles will compete next in the ACC tournament beginning Thursday, March 5 in Greensboro, North Carolina. BC finished seventh in the conference and will play the No. 10 seed Miami. The winner of BC/Miami will play second-seeded Florida State on Friday, March 6 ... Sophomore Carolyn Swords had nine rebounds in the game. She now had 502 career rebounds which places her on the programs 500-500 club. It is the quickest a player has reached 500 rebounds in the programs history (62 games)... Mickel Picco went 4-for-4 from from the three-point line> It was the first time this season, Picco was perfect from the three-point arc this season. In the last two games, Picco is 8-for-10 from the arc ... The Eagles won the battle of the boards for the 23rd time this season. BC is averaging 41 rebouns a game and has a +7.8 margin.
Story by Meredith Cook.
