SHU vs Marquette Game Recap (3/8)

 Rosemont, IL –For the first time ever the No. 25 Seton Hall Pirates (27-4, 16-3)were the top seed in the BIG EAST women's basketball tournament. However, standing in their way to the semifinal round was the last team to hand them a loss, the eight-seeded Marquette Golden Eagles (9-22, 4-14).

On February 15th the game ended in Milwaukee with the Pirates falling 73 –70, this time around it was a different song and dance. Seton Hall lead by as many as 26 points with 10:43 remaining in the second half on their way to a 77 –51 route of the Blue and Gold. This victory for the Hall advances them to their first semifinal appearance in the tournament since 1996, where the then seven-seeded Pirates fell to Notre Dame 69 –58. 

Leading all scorers in the game was 2nd team All-BIG EAST guard, Tabatha Richardson-Smith (Bay City, Texas) with 31 points. The junior scored double figures for the 17th time in conference play this season, opening up with 20 points at halftime. After a cold start, shooting just 3-10 from the field, Richardson-Smith finished down the stretch shooting 6-8 from the floor and pulled down 11 rebounds to earn her seventh double-double of the year. 

All tied up at 17-17 with 7:37 remaining in the first half, a Daisha Simmons (Jersey City, NJ) layup would spark a 23 -6 run the Pirates would take with them into the locker-room. The Hall would score 8 consecutive points in the paint during a two-minute span, all coming from their all-conference trio in the back court of Ka-Deidre Simmons (Newark,NJ), Tabatha Richardson-Smith, and Daisha Simmons. The Hall would finish with 40 total points in the paint compared to Marquette's 20 and out rebounded the Golden Eagles 50 –43. Both Richardson-Smitha and Daisha Simmons finished with a double-double, each pulling down 11 boards individually. 

Daisha Simmons would finish second in scoring for the Hall with 14 total points, and live up to her title of BIG EAST defensive player of the year with two steals and 5 of her 11 boards coming on the defensive end. With the offensive burst the team had, Simmons alluded to the team defense sparking the run after the game, "That's how we got the turnaround in the game and that's when we started to pull away. Even when our offense is not working we've got to rely on our defense because that's what wins games".  

From an individual stand point;no Pirate hit a bigger milestone than Graduate Student point guard, Ka-Deidre Simmons. Simmons finished the game just shy of a double-double with twelve points and eight assists, but history was made with her last dime. Her assist on a Richardson-Smith jumper with 7:47 left in the game gave Ka-Deidre 175 assists on the year. That mark set a new single season record for assists in program history, which was previously set by Simmons herself last season with 174. That adds to the historic year the 1st team all-BIG EAST guard and all time made free-throws leader is having.

After the game Coach Tony Bozzella commented on the milestone for his veteran guard, "I've had the honor and pleasure to coach some great players, and none better than her… she's a remarkable representative of Seton hall. And it's great that she broke that assist record, but I think she's more thrilled that we're playing in the semifinals for the first time since 1996…". 

Coach Bozzella went on about his team's efforts, "We want to win a Big East regular season and tournament championship, and we want to advance into the NCAA tournament, and we've accomplished one of those three goals, and we know we have a lot of work to do for the other two goals".

After the game, Tabatha Richardson-Smith also commented on her team's performance today and what they look to ahead, "… nobody wants to go home, and today we weren't outplayed as a team, and we knew we weren't only playing for ourselves…" the junior's 31 total points fell 2 points shy of setting the tournament record of points in a game with 33, "…we were playing for our fans, the people in South Orange and the people watching the game, playing for our coach… if we keep playing like we're playing, we'll be fine and successful".

Successful is where Tony Bozzella's program finds themselves right now but the team's gears quickly shifted from celebration, back to work. Like the disciplined group they are, one at a time they shuffled out of the locker room in their post-game sweats, found empty seats behind the basket and studied their next potential opponent, 4-seeded St. John's or 5-seeded Creighton;both of which handed them one of their four losses this season.Seton Hall will take on the winner of the 4-5 match-up tomorrow at 5:30 PM CT, and coverage will begin on 89.5 FM WSOU and wsou.net at 5:15 PM. 

Play-by-play: George Balekji

Color: Rohit Ravi

Follow George Balekji on twitter: @GeorgeBalekji

Email: George.balekji@student.shu.edu

Posted in: Sports