Thump, thump, thump.It was a noise heard loud and clear last night in Durham.It wasn't just the sound of the Cameron crazies stomping their feet, nor was it merely the sound of Virginia forward Anna Crosswhite hitting the floor to draw a charge (although she did draw three in the second half).It was instead the sound of Virginia's hopes of making a 20th straight NCAA tournament appearance fall to the floor of Cameron Indoor Stadium.
Last night's embarrassing 75-48 loss dropped the Cavaliers to 4-7 in the ACC and 10-12 overall, as well as depleting the talented but youthful Cavaliers' chances of gaining a birth to the NCAA tournament. This would be the first season in two decades that they would fail to do so.
The Cavaliers had come back from their dismal 0-4 ACC start to win four of it's next six conference games and pull within one game of .500 overall. After a strong showing at home last week against Clemson and Wake Forest, a victory against Duke would put the Cavaliers in good position to climb into the top half of the conference and make a strong run to end the year.
Instead, the team stumbled and faltered throughout the second half against the Blue Devils, showing that they were unable to come close to challenging the women's basketball elite and will likely be watching the NCAA tournament on TV this year.
Virginia's chances looked good with 12:33 left. The Cavaliers had possession of the ball and were down by only four points. Instead of closing the gap, however, the Cavaliers committed a barrage of careless mistakes and practically handed the game to a Duke team whom they had hung tight with most of the game.
Virginia was able to match the hustle of the No. 2 Blue Devils, but its maturity didn't even come close.After Duke scored six straight points and put the crowd on its feet, Virginia coach Debbie Ryan was forced to call a timeout.Instead of regrouping and recovering, the Cavaliers just continued to falter, giving up an additional two straight baskets and falling into a 14 point hole.
From that point, Virginia just continued to fade, playing uninspiredly and practically waving the white flag with more than seven minutes to go.The Cavaliers' shot selection was horrendous and they continued to yield costly turnovers in crucial situations.
The Blue Devils continued to walk all over the Cavaliers and win the game by a 27-point margin.
A Virginia fan in the crowd held up a sign that read "We beat Duke 59-58, January 9, 2003," referring to the controversial ending to the teams' earlier season meeting. In that contest, Duke's Alana Beard scored the tying and winning points from the foul line after Virginia guard Karen Jaeger was called for a loose ball foul at half court with 0.8 seconds left.
The irony of the sign is the fact that Virginia could have won that earlier game, but instead committed a costly, albeit controversial foul when the game was in hand. It was a careless mistake that caused the loss that night.It was countless mistakes that caused the loss last night.And it is the sum of all of these avoidable mistakes that will cause the Cavaliers to snap their NCAA tournament birth streak at 19 straight.
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