College of Charleston
Connecticut
Cougars Set Attendance Record, Fall to UConn
12/22/2011 4:01:00 AM | Women's Basketball
CHARLESTON, S.C. (AP) - In front of a record crowd of 3,868 people the College of Charleston women's basketball team did not allow No. 2 Connecticut a point until the 15:36 mark of the first half, but fell 72-24 at TD Arena Wednesday Night.
The Cougars (2-8, 1-4) were led in scoring by freshman Jazz Green with eight points and junior Megan Fischer added seven points.
Although the Cougars struggled offensively, they held UConn (10-1, 1-0) to 44 percent shooting, forced 14 turnovers and allowed 27 first half points, the lowest total for the Huskies this season. UConn led 27-8 at halftime.
Connecticut kept pouring it on in the second half, scoring the first 18 points of the half before Fischer's 3-pointer cut the Huskies lead to 45-11 with 11:45 to go.
Connecticut Head Coach Geno Auriemma agreed to come to the College of Charleston in part to spread the popularity of women's basketball. The game brought 3,868 people to TD Arena, more than tripling the previous best attendance (1,014 Jan. 31, 2009 vs. Western Carolina) for a Cougars women's game.
Lots of Huskies blue could be seen in the arena, but there were also a few high school teams in their warm-up suits. Charleston played its part by honoring some of the region's best women's basketball players like Katrina McClain and Kalana Greene. The Cougars also honored the jerseys of Lisa Washington and Regina Brown Hall.
The game featured a couple of the giants of coaching in women's basketball with more than 1,300 wins between them. Charleston coach Nancy Wilson brought the Cougars to three AIAW national title games before the NCAA started offering its own titles for women sports, and the Cougars honored those teams before tip-off.
Up next the Cougars take a few days off for the holidays before traveling to New Orleans, La., to compete in the Tulane DoubleTree Classic Dec. 28-29.
QUOTES
CofC Head Coach Nancy Wilson
In General
"We were very happy with the crowd that came out to watch this game. For me it was a great opportunity to honor the players we did as well. What we stressed to the team before the game was stay loose, play hard and have a good time and I think they did that."
On what it meant to see crowd out there
"It was a great treat. We know that a lot of them came to see UConn but we hope that they could appreciate that we were going to play really hard. Hopefully some of them will come back for our next game against Wingate (Jan. 2, 7 p.m.)."
Junior Cathryn Hardy
"It was a lot of fun. I had a great time. Overall I'm thankful that we had this opportunity to play and that Coach Wilson had the opportunity to coach against UConn with us and despite the outcome I had a really great time."
UConn Head Coach Geno Auriemma
On struggle in the first half and If it had to do with Charleston defense
"What they did do is they played really hard and physical and defensively I thought they were really good at getting their body on you and being aggressive. When that happens, if you're not careful you settle for the first jump shot you get and that is what we did."
