Boston College Athletics
Photo by: Joe Sullivan
Despite Defeat, Eagles Deserve Chance To Dance
March 04, 2022 | Women's Basketball, #ForBoston Files
After rallying in the fourth quarter to nearly topple FSU, BC deserves a shot at the NCAA field.
Just over four minutes remained in Boston College's ACC Tournament Second Round matchup with Florida State, but hope long departed the Greensboro Coliseum for the Eagles. They trailed by 13 and hadn't led against the Seminoles since the game's first basket, and FSU's size, length and overall athleticism befuddled a team aiming for its 20th overall victory. BC had shot under 30 percent in the first half, and despite performing better in the third quarter, the Seminoles threatened to run away down the stretch by outsourcing their opponent across all four periods.
The game looked lost, but BC, on a day it seemingly couldn't get out of first gear, somehow found its game in an instant's snap. Taylor Soule scored three straight points with free throws, and consecutive steals by Dontavia Waggoner kickstarted a 7-0 run that extended to 12-1 as time wound down. By the time the two minute warning hit the North Carolina-based crowd, FSU led by a single possession.
The Seminoles never rebuilt their lead, and it wasn't until a final-seconds layup by Morgan Jones that the game fell out of reach on BC. A Herculean effort fell just short in a 63-58 loss, but as both coaches indicated afterwards, the Eagles may have just proven, once and for all, how deserving they are of a shot at the NCAA Tournament.
"I thought my team played really hard, really gutsy," BC head coach Joanna Bernabei-McNamee said, "but like we always say, in tournament time, it's hard to win when you're not making shots…We're a little hurt, we're disappointed, but one thing I know for sure is that I think [Boston College] solidified a spot in the NCAA Tournament, and that's really what we wanted to make sure we came here and did."
BC didn't enter Greensboro expecting to lose its first game of the ACC Tournament, but no shame existed in a loss to Florida State. The Seminoles finished no lower than sixth since finishing ninth in 2014, and their seven double-byes as a top-4 finisher helped build annual trips to the NCAA Tournament every year since 2013. Over that time, they almost always went to the Round of 32 and advanced to three Sweet Sixteens with two Elite Eight berths to their record.
Neither BC nor FSU technically finished eighth or ninth in the league, either, but slotted into their Thursday game due to the ACC's cumulative tiebreaker approach to three or more tied teams. That meant Miami, which finished with an identical 10-8 league record as BC and FSU, earned the No. 6 seed after beating the Seminoles twice during the regular season. The Eagles only played each team once, but the head-to-head win over the Hurricanes wasn't enough in comparison to the 2-1 overall record held by the U.
FSU, meanwhile, technically finished ninth, but that only meant it wore road uniforms against the Eagles on the track that saw the winner slot against top-seeded N.C. State on Friday. But while Miami won its way into a game against second-seeded Louisville, having those types of teams in the league built a miniscule regular season margin of error that evaporated even further in a postseason where one misstep potentially ended a team's championship dream.
"I tell the players, [the ACC Tournament] is the granddaddy of them all," FSU head coach Sue Semrau said. "We were the first to have a women's conference tournament, and it's been an amazing tournament. It's not easy to come in after a brutal season and face somebody you faced 10 days ago. I really credit our players. I credit them for the energy and the focus they had coming in. [You have] a different team every year, and you've got to continue to talk through it every year."
The margin of error was a two-way street on Thursday, and BC's comeback proved it was every bit as elite as Florida State, which advanced to the 2020 ACC Tournament Championship by beating Louisville in the Semifinals. It fell short, but elite teams still find ways to rally, even in games when the best players aren't playing at the height of their powers.
Cameron Swartz, for example, was held to four points in the first half after missing each of her five field goal attempts, but she rallied to score seven points in the fourth quarter alone on 3-of-4 shooting. Taylor Soule, ever the dominant presence with six points in the first half, then scored four in the third to anchor Swartz before adding six in the fourth in a vintage, T-Soule performance. Maria Gakdeng found herself in a little bit of foul trouble in the second half of her postseason debut but still managed to decimate the FS interior for 15 points and six rebounds.
"I told [Cam] to keep shooting and that I loved her," Soule said. "In moments when your shot isn't falling, you feel like there's a million voices in your head, so sometimes it's just a comforting reminder that somebody has your back. It can go a long way with your confidence, [and] she's someone who I tell all the time that I need her back. I hope she feels the same about me, and it has shown offensively multiple times this year."
Dontavia Waggoner, meanwhile, came off the bench and erupted in the fourth quarter for seven points and three boards in the period after going 3-for-3 from the floor.Â
"She is just ultra athletic and takes a lot of pride in playing defense," Bernabei-McNamee said. "Whenever you have a player that takes pride in getting it done on the defensive end, plus is a really good rebounder, it was nice to get that defensive spark. A lot of times you look for an offensive spark coming off the bench. Well there are a lot of times you need to turn to your defensive spark, and that's what Dontavia provides us."
Waggoner had three steals in that fourth quarter alone, and her consecutive swipes jumpstarted BC after the Eagles looked left for dead down the stretch. It was her turn at the top of the full-court press that forced FSU into errors, and she switched off with Soule, who made an athletic interception on a floated inbound ball to continue the drive and intensity against a suddenly shocked Seminole offense.
"As a coach, you know you have a special team when there's exhaustion playing a part but you ask them to turn it up to get into a full-court press," Bernabei-McNamee said. "They believed in themselves, and they really turned up the heat, starting with T-Soule. I thought Dontavia was that huge spark off the bench, coming in and heating them up to turn them over. "
"I just credit our defense," Soule agreed. "In games when you're not shooting the ball well, you rely on what you can control, and defense is something we pride ourselves in. Even when shots weren't falling, we stuck to what we knew and got some stops. I could feel it, and everyone else definitely felt the momentum swinging our way."
BC now departs Greensboro with a 19-11 overall record and awaits the results of the remaining conference tournament with a postseason resume strong enough for an NCAA Tournament berth. Its record mirrors Tennessee's 19-12 berth from the 2019 bracket, and both its RPI and NET rankings are similar to both the Lady Vols and Clemson's NCAA Tournament resume from that year.
The Tigers were granted a No. 9 seed in the tournament with a worse ACC record than BC possessed this year, and they played in the Portland Regional with a berth that was two seeds better than the Lady Vols' No. 11 seed in the Albany Regional. The expansion to 68 teams this year likely would have required a First Four game for Tennessee in 2022, but the strength of the ACC two years ago sent North Carolina into the bracket as a No. 9 seed with an 18-14 record that held less league wins than BC's season this year.
"That's a really good Boston College team," Semrau affirmed. "They are so talented. They've got tremendous weapons at every position. I thought we defended them about as well as we could, but I thought they're a great team. They made a big run at the end, and I was just happy that we were able to sustain [the win]."
The NCAA Tournament selection show is scheduled for Sunday, March 13 at 8 p.m. and will be televised on ESPN.
The game looked lost, but BC, on a day it seemingly couldn't get out of first gear, somehow found its game in an instant's snap. Taylor Soule scored three straight points with free throws, and consecutive steals by Dontavia Waggoner kickstarted a 7-0 run that extended to 12-1 as time wound down. By the time the two minute warning hit the North Carolina-based crowd, FSU led by a single possession.
The Seminoles never rebuilt their lead, and it wasn't until a final-seconds layup by Morgan Jones that the game fell out of reach on BC. A Herculean effort fell just short in a 63-58 loss, but as both coaches indicated afterwards, the Eagles may have just proven, once and for all, how deserving they are of a shot at the NCAA Tournament.
"I thought my team played really hard, really gutsy," BC head coach Joanna Bernabei-McNamee said, "but like we always say, in tournament time, it's hard to win when you're not making shots…We're a little hurt, we're disappointed, but one thing I know for sure is that I think [Boston College] solidified a spot in the NCAA Tournament, and that's really what we wanted to make sure we came here and did."
BC didn't enter Greensboro expecting to lose its first game of the ACC Tournament, but no shame existed in a loss to Florida State. The Seminoles finished no lower than sixth since finishing ninth in 2014, and their seven double-byes as a top-4 finisher helped build annual trips to the NCAA Tournament every year since 2013. Over that time, they almost always went to the Round of 32 and advanced to three Sweet Sixteens with two Elite Eight berths to their record.
Neither BC nor FSU technically finished eighth or ninth in the league, either, but slotted into their Thursday game due to the ACC's cumulative tiebreaker approach to three or more tied teams. That meant Miami, which finished with an identical 10-8 league record as BC and FSU, earned the No. 6 seed after beating the Seminoles twice during the regular season. The Eagles only played each team once, but the head-to-head win over the Hurricanes wasn't enough in comparison to the 2-1 overall record held by the U.
FSU, meanwhile, technically finished ninth, but that only meant it wore road uniforms against the Eagles on the track that saw the winner slot against top-seeded N.C. State on Friday. But while Miami won its way into a game against second-seeded Louisville, having those types of teams in the league built a miniscule regular season margin of error that evaporated even further in a postseason where one misstep potentially ended a team's championship dream.
"I tell the players, [the ACC Tournament] is the granddaddy of them all," FSU head coach Sue Semrau said. "We were the first to have a women's conference tournament, and it's been an amazing tournament. It's not easy to come in after a brutal season and face somebody you faced 10 days ago. I really credit our players. I credit them for the energy and the focus they had coming in. [You have] a different team every year, and you've got to continue to talk through it every year."
The margin of error was a two-way street on Thursday, and BC's comeback proved it was every bit as elite as Florida State, which advanced to the 2020 ACC Tournament Championship by beating Louisville in the Semifinals. It fell short, but elite teams still find ways to rally, even in games when the best players aren't playing at the height of their powers.
Cameron Swartz, for example, was held to four points in the first half after missing each of her five field goal attempts, but she rallied to score seven points in the fourth quarter alone on 3-of-4 shooting. Taylor Soule, ever the dominant presence with six points in the first half, then scored four in the third to anchor Swartz before adding six in the fourth in a vintage, T-Soule performance. Maria Gakdeng found herself in a little bit of foul trouble in the second half of her postseason debut but still managed to decimate the FS interior for 15 points and six rebounds.
"I told [Cam] to keep shooting and that I loved her," Soule said. "In moments when your shot isn't falling, you feel like there's a million voices in your head, so sometimes it's just a comforting reminder that somebody has your back. It can go a long way with your confidence, [and] she's someone who I tell all the time that I need her back. I hope she feels the same about me, and it has shown offensively multiple times this year."
Dontavia Waggoner, meanwhile, came off the bench and erupted in the fourth quarter for seven points and three boards in the period after going 3-for-3 from the floor.Â
"She is just ultra athletic and takes a lot of pride in playing defense," Bernabei-McNamee said. "Whenever you have a player that takes pride in getting it done on the defensive end, plus is a really good rebounder, it was nice to get that defensive spark. A lot of times you look for an offensive spark coming off the bench. Well there are a lot of times you need to turn to your defensive spark, and that's what Dontavia provides us."
Waggoner had three steals in that fourth quarter alone, and her consecutive swipes jumpstarted BC after the Eagles looked left for dead down the stretch. It was her turn at the top of the full-court press that forced FSU into errors, and she switched off with Soule, who made an athletic interception on a floated inbound ball to continue the drive and intensity against a suddenly shocked Seminole offense.
"As a coach, you know you have a special team when there's exhaustion playing a part but you ask them to turn it up to get into a full-court press," Bernabei-McNamee said. "They believed in themselves, and they really turned up the heat, starting with T-Soule. I thought Dontavia was that huge spark off the bench, coming in and heating them up to turn them over. "
"I just credit our defense," Soule agreed. "In games when you're not shooting the ball well, you rely on what you can control, and defense is something we pride ourselves in. Even when shots weren't falling, we stuck to what we knew and got some stops. I could feel it, and everyone else definitely felt the momentum swinging our way."
BC now departs Greensboro with a 19-11 overall record and awaits the results of the remaining conference tournament with a postseason resume strong enough for an NCAA Tournament berth. Its record mirrors Tennessee's 19-12 berth from the 2019 bracket, and both its RPI and NET rankings are similar to both the Lady Vols and Clemson's NCAA Tournament resume from that year.
The Tigers were granted a No. 9 seed in the tournament with a worse ACC record than BC possessed this year, and they played in the Portland Regional with a berth that was two seeds better than the Lady Vols' No. 11 seed in the Albany Regional. The expansion to 68 teams this year likely would have required a First Four game for Tennessee in 2022, but the strength of the ACC two years ago sent North Carolina into the bracket as a No. 9 seed with an 18-14 record that held less league wins than BC's season this year.
"That's a really good Boston College team," Semrau affirmed. "They are so talented. They've got tremendous weapons at every position. I thought we defended them about as well as we could, but I thought they're a great team. They made a big run at the end, and I was just happy that we were able to sustain [the win]."
The NCAA Tournament selection show is scheduled for Sunday, March 13 at 8 p.m. and will be televised on ESPN.
Players Mentioned
F/C
/ Women's Basketball
F
/ Women's Basketball
G
/ Women's Basketball
G
/ Women's BasketballFrom the Desk of Blake James | Episode 8
Friday, April 24
Baseball: 2026 ALS Game vs Virginia Tech Recap
Tuesday, April 21
No. 24 Baseball Defeats Duke (April 18, 2026) - Game 2
Sunday, April 19
No. 24 Baseball Defeats Duke - April 18, 2026 Game 1
Saturday, April 18
