NCAA Women’s Elite Eight: Florida State Puts Up Tournament’s Best Fight Against UConn, Loses 50-90

Hearing the cheerleaders for any of UConn’s poor, floundering opponents yell “DE-FENSE!” is pretty painful, but when Bob Wischusen said Florida State had given the Husky Ladies their best game of the tourney, he wasn’t kidding. Of course, at that point UConn led 64-34, but moral victories are about all that’s available when Geno Auriemma and his merry band of basket-killers occupy the opposite bench.
For much of the first half, this looked like it might actually be a ballgame. FSU took three minutes to score their first bucket, but managed to keep UConn’s lead in the six- to seven-point range for quite some time. Maya Moore had two fouls early and spent the last 13 minutes of the half on the bench, which may have contributed to some false sense of hope -- though the ‘Noles trailed 28-42 at halftime, Moore came back with a fierceness in the second and a 20-point lead was not long in coming.
In her absence, Tina Charles led UConn with a first-half double-double, with 16 points and eleven rebounds. Moore ended up with 22 points and eight rebounds in just 20 minutes. Final score: UConn 90, FSU 50. It’s the fourth time the Husky Ladies have cracked 90 points this tournament, and the first time any opponent has managed to get out of the thirties against them. In this year’s tournament, against this UConn team, that really is what passes for a successful campaign.