A Look Back At A Successful Season
March 25, 2008 | Women's Basketball
The 2007-08 women's basketball team will be remembered as one of the youngest teams in Division I, the last team to ever compete in the Atlantic Sun, the obstacles it overcame throughout the year and the best finish in school history in the A-Sun.
True fans of the team will not look at the 13-18 record, but it
will see a team that came out with such intensity and ferocity
every time it stepped on the court.
To not only compete, but to win many close games as one of the five
youngest teams in Division I on the season says a lot about the
mentality of the players, the coaches in addition to being a little
naïve to the fact that being so young, the team was not
supposed to win as many games as it did. The team was not supposed
to be third in the league and it was not supposed to reach the .500
mark in conference competition.
However, the Bulldogs, coached by Rick Reeves and his tremendous staff, accomplished the aforementioned items while tacking on many more prestigious honors to the program's young, but storied Division I history with one senior, six sophomores and seven freshmen on the squad.
The team was picked to finish fifth in the preseason poll, but one of the team's ahead of the Bulldogs – Kennesaw State – was ineligible for postseason play due to reclassification to Division I status. GWU was third among team teams that were eligible for Division I postseason play by finishing the season at 8-8 in conference competition.
Sophomore Margaret Roundtree did well enough for the A-Sun's coaches to elect her to the all-conference second-team. For the first time in its Division I history, a Bulldog student-athlete got another honor – the A-Sun's Freshman of the Year award. Rookie Monique Hudson garnered that award while also being named to the all-freshman team by the league's coaches. Fellow GWU student-athlete and Monique's twin sister, Dominique Hudson, also etched her name on the all-freshman team.
Sitting at 2-9 on December 16, the Gardner-Webb team got a huge boost from its lone senior – LaToya Carter. Carter had missed many of the previous games due to student-teaching obligations so she could earn her degree, which she did. Carter, who averaged just 2.4 points per game and 2.6 rebounds per contest for her career entering her senior campaign, brought much more to the team than what showed up in box score. She brought with her an air of toughness, a degree of confidence and a positive outlook that rubbed off on her teammates. Carter also brought a tenacious defender who would go up against many of the players in the league that were bigger and stronger, but she held her own. In doing so, Carter posted career highs for points (3.9), rebounds (4.3) and she led the team with a 54.5 field goal percentage, which ranks as the program's best since making the move to Division I.
Upon Carter's arrival, the team carried with it a renewed outlook on the season – and it showed immediately. GWU first picked off UNC-Asheville – a team it had lost to a month before by 16 points – by downing the Bulldogs and future Big South opponent by a score of 82-70. The win gave GWU a sense of confidence it needed heading into the Christmas break.
After the 15-day layoff, the Bulldogs picked up right where they left off – by beating another future Big South opponent. This time, it was the Panthers of High Point that Reeves's team knocked off, 75-62. The win was huge as it sent the young Bulldogs into A-Sun competition with two straight victories.
GWU continued its hot streak at home against Lipscomb in the conference opener. After trailing t the intermission, the Bulldogs rallied behind Dominique Hudson's career-high 20 points to shoot down the Lady Bisons 82-70 in front of a frenzied crowd in Paul Porter Arena. The Red and Black then faced a daunting task when it played host to defending A-Sun champion Belmont. However, GWU sent the Bruins into hibernation behind Roundtree's near-double-double effort of 24 points (a career high) and nine boards, allowing the team to pick up a 75-62 victory.
Just five days later, the Bulldogs had to make the tough trek into Johnson City, Tenn., to take on the eventual A-Sun champion ETSU Lady Bucs. GWU fell behind early by 12 points, but the squad didn't know it was supposed to lose. Instead, the team fought back to trail by only three at the intermission. From the time that Reeves inserted Courtney Epps into the line-up, the team picked up on the defensive end, opening the way for easy buckets in transition. Monique Hudson scored 20 points while Laura Povilonyte and Carter each pulled down nine rebounds in the 11-point victory. The win, giving GWU a 3-0 start in the league, marked just one of two times anyone in the league would defeat ETSU during the 2007-08 season – and it'd mark the only A-Sun tournament eligible team to do so.
The Bulldogs continued its road trip at nearby USC-Upstate, pulling off a 73-56 victory after a sluggish start. Povilonyte again earned top honors by dropping in 17 points in the contest. The win – GWU's school-record setting sixth straight – gave fans a reason to go out and support the team.
Although the Bulldogs dropped the next four games, the team responded by being the victor in four of the next five, re-establishing itself as a team to be reckoned with not only the rest of the season, but for the next couple of years. GWU got back on track with a swarming defense at UNF, allowing the squad to win by a 67-51 score.
A loss at Kennesaw State was not a reason to worry for Reeves as his team bounced back by downing Mercer behind Povilonyte's career-high 24 points. The team stayed hot, defeating Campbell by 10 and USC-Upstate by 20 over the next two games. In each of the contests, the Bulldogs' swarming defense attacked the opposition – and in the case of the Spartans, GWU held the visitors without a basket for the last 8:17 of the contest while outscoring the squad 25-4. In the win over the Fighting Camels, a 10-0 run over a three-minute span in the second half gave the Bulldogs the breathing room it needed for the victory.
After finishing the regular season at Belmont, the Bulldogs stayed in Nashville, Tenn., to prepare for the conference tournament. Their opponent – for the third consecutive season was Campbell. The two squared off in a showdown of epic proportions, with the Bulldogs pulling off a 57-56 win over the Fighting Camels. The win meant something that fans can hang their hat on. Of the current A-Sun teams, the Bulldogs are the only team to have never lost a first-round game at the conference tournament, having advanced to at least the semifinals all three seasons it made the field.
GWU fell in the semifinals to No. 2 seed Jacksonville, ending its chance at winning the league's automatic berth in the NCAA Tournament.
Looking back, every student-athlete on the team stepped up in one way or another, whether it showed up in the box score or not. From the start of the season, the team had a few consistent players, but the so-called role players stepped up on a daily basis – and it began with the season-opening win over Montreat.
In the win over Montreat, Monique Hudson came off the bench to record a school-record nine steals. The next night, she posted a career-high 23 points as the Bulldogs nearly became the first A-Sun team to knock off a BIG EAST opponent.
Against IUPUI, LaTroya Pope dropped in a career-best 12 points, but her strong defense on all-conference selection Marlena Murphy propelled the Bulldogs past Campbell in the first round of the A-Sun Tournament. To go along with Pope's solid effort against the Fighting Camels was Jessica Bryant's best game of the season, having slowly recovered from an injury that forced her to miss the entire 2006-07 campaign.
Meranda Burnett was consistent at the point all year long, dishing out a team-best 81 assists in the 31 games. She was also clutch from the charity stripe, connecting on 82 percent of her shots.
Jenny Sprouse got her first career start in the loss at Longwood, but played solid ball. She then started all six games of the record-setting win streak and continued to hit the big shot throughout the season when she was called upon.
Sherika Montgomery took some time to get back in the flow of things after having to sit out last season due to the transfer rule. However, her 11 rebounds kept the Bulldogs in the game against NCAA Tournament foe Cornell. Throughout the last few weeks of the season, she stepped up her game and should continue to improve next season.
Although Emma Cronk, Ashley Falknor and Teri Higgenbottom didn't get in the scoring column as much as the others, all three played key roles at times. Cronk presented match-up problems for the opposition while Falknor was tremendous at hitting the mid-range jumper. Higgenbottom was a solid free throw shooter who was in at the end of close games. She also played well in spurts, being able to find the open player, pick up the loose ball or play good defense.
With the return of virtually every student-athlete, Reeves and
his team should be a force to be reckoned with in the Big South
next season. Should the players learn from their mistakes and
recognize their potential, the team could reach its ultimate goal
of making the NCAA Tournament in the spring of 2009.
