THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, January 12, 1996 TAG: 9601120644
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: C1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY VICKI L. FRIEDMAN, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: KNOXVILLE, TENN. LENGTH: Medium: 80 lines
The Lady Monarchs have given lessons in pressure defense to opponents all season long, but Thursday night against the fourth-ranked Volunteers they got schooled themselves in a 69-47 pounding in Thompson-Boling Arena.
Nothing went right for 15th-ranked ODU (10-2) as it dropped its 15th straight to Tennessee.
``I never felt we were in the flow of things right from the jump,'' said Lady Monarchs coach Wendy Larry. ``Ticha (Penicheiro) is very important to us, in our execution, and she struggled with the handle. A lot of our players draw from how she is feeling. We never really entered the ball.''
Tennessee, which had dropped its last two games to Connecticut and Georgia outrebounded ODU 44-31 and shot 53 percent in the second half, manhandling the Lady Monarchs using the same aggressive style ODU used against Texas and Colorado.
``We don't find this kind of defense every day,'' Penicheiro said. ``They took us out of our game. Tennessee and Stanford - both teams pressured us the same way and we lost.''
But Vols coach Pat Summitt had some praise of her own for ODU. ``That's about the toughest man-to-man defense we've seen,'' said Summitt, whose Vols have faced Virginia, Stanford, UConn and Georgia this year.
Neither team shot particularly well in the early going, and the score stayed tied at 6 for nearly five minutes. An uncharacteristically sloppy ODU team turned the ball over 14 times, including five traveling violations. The Vols weren't much better with 15 turnovers, but they capitalized on their shots and went into the dressing up 21-13 after a 9-1 run in the half's closing minutes.
``I think the most important thing to do when you come to Knoxville is come out and execute,'' Larry said. ``Unfortunately for Old Dominion, it wasn't a pretty picture. Sometimes if wishes could be horses, we'd put on a CAA uniform and play Tennessee. Unfortunately we see orange when we come here; we don't play up to our level.''
And as Larry would lament several times in her postgame press conference, the Lady Monarchs failed to finish their shots, making their points few and far between. Nyree Roberts led ODU with 13 points and Clarisse Machanguana had 11.
The second half started as miserably as the first ended for the Lady Monarchs - with Mery Andrade having her inbounds pass stolen. Still ODU got as close as eight twice, but failed to convert a pair of turnovers into points. The Vols, meanwhile, fell into an offensive rhythm that they lacked their last two games to UConn and Georgia, their first consecutive losses in five years.
``In the first half, the post players, we were rushing our shots,'' said Abby Conklin, who came off the bench to lead all scorers with 19. ``In the second half, I relaxed, took my shots, turnaround jumpers and let the game come to me.''
ODU also found itself in foul trouble with almost the whole second half to go. Machanguana picked up back-to-back personals for her third and fourth fouls with more than 15 minutes left, and Andrade's fourth personal came with 15:14 remaining. And the bench players - Amber Eller, Stacy Himes, Angie Liston and Esther Benjamin - could only manage eight points between them.
``I never saw our team shooting so many airballs,'' Roberts said. ``Airballs, taking bad shots. That's not us.''
Even the free throws weren't dropping. ODU, which came into the game shooting 71 percent from line, hit only 9 of 17 from the stripe for 52 percent. The trademark treys, which have worked like magic for ODU all season - were bricks, too, behind a 1-of-11 effort.
``I think Tennessee did a phenomenal job of shutting us down,'' Penicheiro said. ``Our defense was with us in the first half, but not in the second.''
NOTE: ODU senior Sarah Willyerd, still sore from a twisted back, did not make the trip to Knoxville. ILLUSTRATION: Color AP Photo
ODU's Ticha Penicheiro, who is a key to the Lady Monarchs' attack,
had trouble with the defense of Latina Davis and her Tennessee
teammates.
by CNB