The old cliche in sports is that it's hard to beat a team three times in one season.
It proved impossible for the Cincinnati Bearcats last night. After beating Marquette once in Milwaukee and once in Cincinnati, Marquette came out on the winning end in the third match up between the two teams this season.
It wasn't easy, though. Five ties and five lead changes all happened before Cincinnati went on a run at the end of the first half to take a 28-21 lead at intermission. A 9-0 burst early in the second half gave MU a 36-24 lead with a bit more than 14 minutes remaining. The Bearcats would manage to pull even on three different occasions, but MU never let Cincinnati get back in front for the rest of the game.
Katie Young led Marquette in scoring with 17 points while Arlesia Morse lived up to her All-Big East Freshman Team billing by pouring in 16. Both women hit 4 three pointers in the course of the game. Morse got her last two points VERY late in the game as she drained both of her only two free throws of the game to make sure that the Bearcats could only tie the game on a desperation heave at the buzzer that ended up missing, but just barely.
The win means Marquette advances to face #6 seed Rutgers in the second round tonight, so expect more on that later. Til then, you can check out some highlights here, a post game interview with coach Terri Mitchell here and one with Arlesia Morse here.
After the jump: Four Factors and Awards!
Four Factors:
eFG%: MU - 40.4% UC - 35.3%
TO%: MU - 25.2% UC - 17.2%
OReb%: MU - 27.5% UC - 21.1%
FT Rate: MU - 38.5% UC - 41.2%
Points Per Possession: MU - 0.80, UC - 0.797
Abbie Willenborg Player Of The Game: Hard to go wrong with Katie Young here. The only one giving her chase would obviously be Arlesia Morse, but she did cough up the ball 7 times. Young added 7 rebounds and a steal to her game high 17 points.
Clare Barnard Undersung Eagle Of The Game: I kinda want to give it to Apiew Ojulu as she played 10 minutes in her first action since February 4th. Instead we'll give it to Sarina Simmons and her 11 rebounds along side 6 points on 3-9 shooting.