Tulane Women Fall in Season Finale to South Florida, 58-49
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In its final regular season game of the season, the Tulane women’s basketball team put up a dog fight from start to finish against one of the top American Conference teams, South Florida, in Fogelman Arena, but came up short in the end, 58-49 to the Bulls.
Next up for the Green Wave, the American Conference tournament, which begins Tuesday, March 10th in Birmingham. Tulane, set as the 10th seed in the tourney, will play Temple, the tournament's 7th seed, in a first round game set for 2 p.m. CDT. The contest will be on ESPN+ and on WRBH, 88.3 FM.
First Quarter: South Florida 13 - Tulane 12
It was not a pretty first ten minutes for either team. The visiting Bulls shot just 29% from the field. Tulane was worse, hitting only 27% of their field goals. USF had four turnovers in the first period. Not to be outdone, the Green Wave turned over the ball a half-dozen times. Both teams had 10-rebounds apiece.
The Wave didn’t hit their first field goal until the 5:01 mark of that first quarter.
Halftime: Tulane 23 - South Florida 22
The Green Wave was able to turn up the offense a tad, hitting 33% of their shots by the end of the first half. We can’t say the same for the Bulls, who dropped to a 26% clip by the end of the first twenty minutes of play. Tulane had only three more turnovers in the 2nd period, while South Florida loaded another four to their tally. Rebounding still pretty much even with the Bulls getting 21-total and the Wave pulling down 20.
The difference in the first half was the charity stripe. Tulane hit 8-of-the-10 they shot in the first half while USF only went to the line one time.
No one was in double digits for Tulane after the first half. CC Mays led the way off the bench with a half dozen points. Mecailin Marshall had five. Jayda Brown and Kanija Daniel had four apiece.
Third Quarter: Tulane 42 - South Florida 41
South Florida went on an impressive 8-0 run midway through the 3rd period to take four-point lead, but staunch defense by the Green Wave after that led to turnovers on multiple possessions by the Bulls, giving the Wave the lead back at the 3:16 mark to which they held on to until the end of the period.
Tulane was hitting 32% of their shots cumulatively through three. South Florida was at the 33% mark. The Bulls turned the ball over 13 times to Tulane’s dozen. But it was again the free throw discrepancy that made the different. USF hit 4-of-their-7 from the charity stipe, while Tulane was an impressive 14-of-16.
Mecailin Marshall cut to the basket time and again, sometimes against much longer reaches from the South Florida bigs at the baseline. USF had a block or two against the true freshman, but the guard from Abernathy, Texas led the way for Tulane by the end of the third stanza as the only Greenie in double-digits with 16.
Final Score: South Florida 58 - Tulane 49
It was back-and-forth final period of play that came down to missed shots by the Wave and a made shots by USF.
Tulane led by five with 8:14 to go in the final period. Then, missed shots after missed shot by the Green Wave, along with offensive tipins by the Bulls led to an 8-point swing in favor of the visitors. Amira Mabry’s lone three of the game tied it briefly with three minutes to go, but the misses continued by the Wave, while the South Florida makes added to their advantage.
Leading the way scoring for the Wave, Marshall with a team-high 18. No other Greenie hit double digits. The 5' 10" freshman also had a team high 11-rebounds.
Doug has covered a gamut of sporting events in his fifty-plus years in the field. He started doing sideline reporting for Louisiana Tech football games for the student radio station. Doug was Sports Director for KNOE-AM/FM in Monroe in the mid-80s, winning numerous awards from the Louisiana Sports Writers Association for Best Sportscast and Best Play-by-Play. High school play-by-play for teams in Monroe, Natchitoches, New Orleans, and Thibodaux, LA dot his resume. He did college play-by-play for Northwestern State University in Natchitoches for nine years. Then, moving to the Crescent City, Doug did television PBP of Tulane games and even filled in for legendary Tulane broadcaster, Ken Berthelot in the only game Kenny ever missed while doing the Green Wave games. His father was an alumnus of Tulane in the 1940s, so Doug has attended Tulane football games in old Tulane Stadium, the Superdome, and Yulman. He was one of the 86,000 plus on December 1, 1973, sitting in the North End Zone to seeTulane shutout the LSU Tigers, 14-0. He was there when the Posse ruled Fogelman and in Turchin when the Wave made it to the World Series. He currently is the public address voice of the Tulane baseball team.