Eagles Return Home From Fort Myers Disappointed But Undaunted

There are times that a basketball team steps on the floor and feels better than its opponent. The players and their commitment to their system shines for long stretches of a game, and the chemistry and cohesion between passes and shots lifts the ceiling off the players' individual abilities. Together as one, everyone feels like the better team.

Unfortunately in basketball, that doesn't always translate to a winning formula, and on Saturday night, Boston College felt like the better team in its Fort Myers Tip-Off Third Place Game matchup against Wisconsin. The two Shell Division opponents each lost on Friday night to other power conference basketball programs, but they each waltzed onto the court on Saturday with very different positions that didn't necessarily translate to the final score of an 82-72 win by the Badgers.

"We just have to keep growing," said head coach Joanna Bernabei-McNamee. "We have to learn from these mistakes and learn from these games. I feel like we were the better team. Credit to Wisconsin that they took [the game] at us and they won after a hard fight, but I just think that we [can be] a better team."

Snatching the win away from the Eagles was a credit to the Badgers' overall toughness after both teams challenged one another for three-plus quarters. They battered one another and built an on-court atmosphere reminiscent of postseason basketball to which Wisconsin's half-court offense broke out in the fourth quarter while shooting 69 percent in the period alone.

The Badgers shot 3-for-5 from outside as BC gambled and sputtered, and the 12 rebounds flipped how the Eagles initially ran them off the floor with fast break points. More made baskets prevented BC from getting out in transition, and Sania Copeland and Serah Williams both went for double-digit scoring in the third and fourth quarters while providing Wisconsin with different viewpoints on a game plan that scored 18 points in the paint after the first half break.

"We started to gamble a little bit defensively," Bernabei-McNamee said, "and they made us pay. We just really missed some shots that you had to have in a close game. It's not that we weren't open, we just missed a couple of layups and missed a couple of threes. On the defensive end, we just had to hunker down and stick to the game plan, but we gambled a bit trying to make something happen, and they made us pay by hitting shots while pounding it a little bit more inside."

BC, meanwhile, fell out of sync after spending most of the game running Wisconsin off the Fort Myers court. The first half had ended with the Eagles in front after initially trailing in the first quarter, and the large bulk of offense piled on the Badgers after BC flipped the game's turnover numbers following the first six minutes. Initially trailing 7-3 in that department, the Eagles caused nine giveaways before the end of the first half, to which the plus-4 number on points off turnovers, along with fast break points, forced the bigger and slower Wisconsin lineup to commit seven fouls in the second quarter alone.

"We've just got to make sure that we never let [lapses] happen," Bernabei-McNamee said. "We've got to just look at the player across from us and say, 'You're not going to beat me,' and then play hard over and over again, possession after possession, and that's something that we've been really working to get better at."

Natalie Leuzinger kept Wisconsin afloat in that first half by going 4-for-4 against the BC defense, but the Eagles countered her production with Andrea Daley's 11 points and six points apiece from Dontavia Waggoner, T'Yana Todd, and Teya Sidberry. All finished in double figures with Daley leading all scorers with a game-high 21 while Waggoner finished 4-for-7 shooting with five steals on the defensive end and both Todd and Sidberry powered through 10-point and 15-point games, respectively, with Sidberry holding seven rebounds, including three on offense.

That ball movement stemmed from Kaylah Ivey's return performance, and her nine assists revved BC's engine one day after a different energy emerged during the loss to Marquette, an NCAA Tournament team from last season. The Eagles never let the Golden Eagles run away with a double-digit lead in the fourth quarter, and what could have been a 20-point loss instead slipped into a trademark, gritty finish that produced a 14-6 run for BC over the final five minutes.

Large swaths were directly tilted to BC in that game, and a superstar lineup struggled with several glaring mishaps. First Team All-Big East selection Jordan King had eight turnovers as part of the Golden Eagles' 20-turnover game against the Eagles, and graduate transfer Frannie Hottinger, the Patriot League's Player of the Year last year, was limited to two field goal attempts and six rebounds due to her ongoing foul trouble. Having played a big role in Marquette's blowout win over Saint Peter's, she was instead relegated to secondary status behind shot blocker Liza Karlen, who in turn struggled with her worst shooting game of the season.

"I thought we played so hard in the fourth quarter," Bernabei-McNamee said on Friday, "but it was almost like it was a little too late. We missed a lot of free throws, and I think it's a different game [if we make more]. We win the game if we shoot 90 percent from the free throw line."

That game drove home how BC was good enough to hang with some of the best teams in the nation, but the Eagles left Fort Myers without a win because of the fourth quarter shooting performance by Copeland and company. Her seven points in the quarter were one less than Williams, who went 2-for-2, but Williams and Brooke Schramek grabbed a combined eight rebounds as the Badgers cleaned up their foul trouble. They reverted back to the minimal turnovers from the start of the game with three giveaways over the entire quarter, and their four assists equaled the number of made baskets by a BC offense that just couldn't find its groove.

That performance ultimately pushed a second loss across BC's trip to Fort Myers, but the flight home only provides so much proverbial runway before the Eagles have to return to the road to play at Kentucky on Thursday in the inaugural ACC/SEC Challenge. It's the last road game for the team before five consecutive home games against local opponents, but the Wildcats ended their weekend trip to the Paradise Jam with a 24-point loss to Cincinnati.

Kentucky was the unlikeliest SEC champion two years ago, but its ten consecutive trips to the NCAA Tournament ended last year after a 2-14 season in-conference. Those lone league wins over Florida and Missouri slotted the Wildcats into the First Round of the SEC Tournament, but a miracle run to the Quarterfinals included a 71-58 win over Alabama and a nine-point loss to Tennessee.

Though its last appearance in the tournament in 2022 ended in a First Round loss, Kentucky advanced out of the Round of 64 in nine straight tournaments with three trips to the Elite Eight.

"We have to keep remembering that this is something we get to do," Bernabei-McNamee said. "It's fleeting, and it goes by so fast. There are 30-something opportunities per year that you work so hard for, that you want to showcase what you can do and show out, and I think [we] could start taking more advantage of the opportunities that we're given. We've got to remember that this is something that we're continuing to earn by working hard.

"They know it," she added. "They're as disappointed as I am with this game, and we're going to continue making changes to get competitive advantages and confidence. We're going to figure that out over the next few days, and it's another opportunity [at Kentucky] that's coming our way."

Boston College Athletics

Eagles Return Home From Fort Myers Disappointed But Undaunted

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