Indiana Women Cruise Past Charlotte, Advance to Second Round in NCAA Tournament

No. 3-seeded Indiana showed Charlotte what Big Ten basketball is all about, with the Hoosiers winning 85-51 in the first round of the NCAA women's basketball tournament Saturday at Simon Skjodt Assembly Hall. Junior forward Mackenzie Holmes led the Hoosiers with 19 points, her best showing since returning from knee surgery.

Author:
Haley Jordan
Updated:
Mar 19, 2022 6:44 PM EDT

BLOOMINGTON, Ind. — No. 3-seed Indiana cruised past the No. 14-seed Charlotte 49ers 85-51 in the first round of the NCAA Tournament in front of Hoosier Nation at Simon Skjodt Assembly Hall.

There’s no telling how many fans were Hoosiers but from the sea of cream and crimson, it’s a safe guess to assume most of the 6,389 fans were there to see Indiana host the tournament for the first time in history.

“We had to win some games in the Big Ten Tournament in order for this to happen, so really kudos to our players for giving us this opportunity, and we wanted to share it with our fans,” Indiana coach Teri Moren said.

Indiana clicked on both sides of the ball shooting 55 percent from the field off of five Hoosiers scoring in double figures. Ten Hoosiers got involved by scoring. Junior forward Mackenzie Holmes led Indiana with 19 points for her best performance since before her knee surgery back in February.

“I just am trying to get better every single day,” Holmes said. “My coaches and my teammates have been really pushing me to do so the past couple weeks, so I think it's been super beneficial, and I'm just really happy to be here and to be moving to the next round.”

Moren said she let Holmes stay in longer than usual to get her conditioned for the rest of the tournament. Holmes iced her knee following the game to prevent any injury regressions.

Senior guard Grace Berger added 18 points followed by senior forward Aleksa Gulbe’s 15 points and graduate student guard Nicole Cardaño-Hillary’s 11 points.

Nicole Cardaño-Hillary

Forty-six of those paints came in the paint as part of Moren’s offensive strategy to create balanced scoring with both layups and dominant post play.

Indiana outshone Charlotte in every category except for offensive rebounding. The Hoosiers shared the sugar, as Moren likes to call it, with 23 assists compared to the 49er’s seven and out-rebounded Charlotte 37-32.

The 49ers struggled offensively shooting 37 percent from the field and only 13 percent from the three-point line. Nonetheless, the team moved mountains by earning their spot in the tournament after a nine-year NCAA drought.

To start off, 49ers sophomore forward Molina Williams hit a three-pointer, but graduate student guard Ali Patberg answered with a layup. Gulbe got in on the action with a three-pointer with just above eight minutes to go.

Charlotte senior guard Jada McMillan cashed in for two tying up the score above the six-minute mark. The fast-paced first quarter soon affected the 49ers who missed five shots in a row but still managed to stay within four points of Indiana.

Charlotte fifth-year guard Octavia Jett-Wilson came to the rescue swishing one to tie up the score once again.

“She's terrific,” Moren said. “She's the Player of the Year in Conference USA, and she's a three-level kind of scorer. We knew that she was going to be a handful going into this game. That was not lost on us.”

Sophomore guard Chloe Moore-McNeil entered the game for Indiana and made a big three-pointer with less than three minutes to play in the quarter to get the Hoosiers off on a successful run.

Indiana went 6-for-6 from the free throw line during the first period and gained momentum off of a 9-0 run to give themselves a 10-point cushion at the buzzer.

To open up the second quarter, Berger hit a jumper to force Charlotte to call a timeout. The Hoosiers continued to pull away with Gulbe’s successful and-1 three-point play as part of a 7-0 run.

Aleksa Gulbe

After a short break from making shots, Gulbe hit her second triple of the game to give the Hoosiers a 20-point lead. Berger finished off the half with her signature jumper as Indiana led 42-24 at the buzzer.

“She doesn't take a rep off,” Gulbe said of Berger. “She doesn't take a play off, and that's at practice, but it translates onto the court, as well. Just being able to play alongside her the past couple years is really special, and she's a great player.”

Moren added that Berger will play professionally after her time at Indiana while Charlotte head coach Cara Consuegra said she’s one of the best players in the country.

Grace Berger

Patberg opened up the second half with a long jumper followed by Holmes’s steal that landed in the hands of Gulbe for two more points to break 50.

“Leks was terrific today,' Moren said. “She posted hard. Obviously she can stretch you out. She showed you that she's more than just a player that plays with her back to the basket.”

The 49ers saw their tournament life slip away as they entered more than a four-minute scoring drought while everything was clicking for Indiana who led by 29 points before the final period.

“I think it's important to keep running because our team is playing fast,” Gulbe said. “We try to play fast, and we're conditioned to do that. We have to play our game no matter what the score is.”

Patberg’s three-pointer around the seven-minute mark gave the Hoosiers a 30-point lead allowing Indiana’s bench to trickle in to close it out.

“You build a lead and then some of those kids that have to sit over there and cheer and give us good energy for the five that are usually out there on the floor a lot — from a coaching perspective, that's what you want,” Moren said.

The 49ers’ best effort to chip away would do no good as Indiana got another win in front of its home crowd.

Although Indiana’s offense was top notch, Moren still swears by her team’s defensive play and will rely on it as the Hoosiers advance to the second round on Monday where they will face the winner of the Princeton, Kentucky game.

“I'll go back and just say this: what's going to carry us throughout this tournament will be our defense, our ability to defend and rebound,” Moren said.

HOOSIERS TO PLAY CHARLOTTE IN FIRST ROUND: For the first time in program history, No. 3-seed Indiana will host the first and second rounds of the NCAA Tournament. First, the Hoosiers will face No. 14-seed Charlotte, the C-USA's regular season and tournament champions, in the first round. CLICK HERE.
ALI PATBERG WILL BE THE KEY TO DEEP TOURNAMENT RUN: Indiana guard Ali Patberg has been a part of five NCAA Tournaments during her first two seasons at Notre Dame and her four seasons at Indiana. Her super seniority and postseason knowledge will be critical as the Hoosiers enter their third consecutive NCAA Tournament on Saturday. CLICK HERE.
GRACE BERGER EARNS AP ALL-AMERICAN HONORABLE MENTION: Senior guard Grace Berger joins only one other Indiana player in the Associated Press All-American club announced on Wednesday. The Louisville native is averaging 16.3 points per game and has scored in double figures 27 times this season. CLICK HERE.