Attendance for GW women’s basketball games has always been lackluster. When No. 1 Tennessee came to Foggy Bottom, filling the Smith Center stands Wednesday night was no problem. A crowd of 3,207 showed up to see GW lose 59-43 to the Lady Vols.
Despite the loss, GW held the Lady Vols to their lowest point total this season.
The Colonials (2-3) started off on a 7-2 run and played the Lady Vols tough for the first half, but were not able to keep the momentum going. Tennessee (8-0) picked up its play in the second half, holding GW to 21.7 percent shooting after intermission.
“I think that we started out lackadaisical,” Tennessee senior Shanna Zolman said. “That lack of intensity that we showed definitely turned out in the turnovers that we had. They came out and pressured us a lot out of their zone. They did a good job switching up their match up zone, kind of keeping us on our toes and putting a lot of pressure on us in spurts. We did a poor job in taking care of it and did a poor job in making decisions.”
Senior Jessica Simmonds led GW’s scoring with 13 points while sophomore Sarah-Jo Lawrence was the only other Colonial in double figures, with 11. The usually high-scoring sophomore Kim Beck was held to five points on 1-for-4 shooting from the floor.
Redshirt freshman Candace Parker had 14 points and eight rebounds for Tennessee, with Zolman scoring an additional 12 points. Nicky Anosike had eight points in 26 minutes.
The Colonials trailed 34-29 at the half, the second-closest score margin the Lady Vols have had all season. No. 8 Maryland trailed Tennessee by four, and went on to lose 80-75.
“I think we all came in at halftime and we were just disappointed about how we were playing,” redshirt freshman Candace Parker said.
In the second half, Tennessee took over. After leading 42-37 with 14 minutes remaining in the game, the Lady Vols went on a 10-0 run, with the Colonials failing to score a point in more than seven and a half minutes.
Simmonds broke GW’s scoring silence with a two-point field goal with 5:28 remaining. The only other points the Colonials registered in the game came from two free throws made by Simmonds and a Beck field goal. The Lady Vols continued their undefeated season with a 59-43 win.
The Colonials shot 34.8 percent from the floor with eight missed free throws; the Lady Vols shot 46.2 percent while missing only three shots from the foul line.
Tennessee also took advantage of holes in the Colonials’ passing, scoring 22 points off turnovers. Tennessee’s prowess below the net game them 18 second-chance points, compared to the Colonials’ two.
“We’re a basketball team that played in spurts tonight,” legendary Tennesee Coach Pat Summitt said. “I’m really disappointed that we didn’t come out and take care of the basketball in the way that we need to. I thought that George Washington came out with a lot more intensity and did a good job against our defense.”
The Colonials looked at the loss as a learning experience that will help them in the future.
“We lost, but I think we hung with them,” Beck said. “We can play with anyone in the country. We know that, we proved that. Going into the conference and the rest of the non-conference games, we can compete with everybody and we will compete with everybody, and we’re looking for a win, we’re not just looking to play people. I think that’s going to help us mentally.”
McKeown said he thinks his squad’s problems are on the offensive end.
“We’ve got to find some scoring,” McKeown said. “We defend well, we just have to find ways to score. Anytime you walk out of here in December, you feel like let’s build off of this game. It was a great atmosphere for our kids, you don’t want to have any negative things, you want to make it a teaching point, everything that we did wrong. So we’ll try to build off it.”
GW returns to action Saturday at 1 p.m. when Stony Brook (N.Y.) comes to Foggy Bottom.
