Dec. 4, 2011
Athens, Ga. – The Georgia Tech women’s basketball team fell to 5-3 on the season after its late rally came up just short and the No. 15/14 Georgia Lady Bulldogs, 7-1, held on for a 75-68 win at Stegeman Coliseum Sunday afternoon in Athens.
Senior center Sasha Goodlett notched her first double-double of the season with 19 points and a season-high 12 rebounds and sophomore guard Tyaunna Marshall tossed in 19 points and added nine boards to lead the Yellow Jackets. Senior point guard Metra Walthour added 14 points, including two big 3-pointers down the stretch to spark the Tech comeback.
“I’m really proud of our effort tonight, especially our resiliency down the stretch,” head coach MaChelle Joseph said. “We never gave up, no matter what the score was and continued to make plays. Obviously, it was too little, too late. I thought Georgia did a great job scoring tonight and that’s probably the most points we’ve given up in a while. We were able to get it done rebounding tonight, we had 47, but we’ve got to be able to capitalize on that.”
Georgia opened the game with a 6-2 run, but the Jackets quickly rallied and gave a glimpse to what the rest of the contest would contain. Tech grabbed its first lead, 11-10, on a Sasha Goodlett layup from Mo Bennett at the 15:47 mark of the first half.
There were four ties in the opening 20 minutes and five lead changes, with each side leading by as many as six points.
Marshall, who had 20 points as a freshman against Georgia last season in Atlanta, had 10 first half points to lead the Jackets at the break.
After Marshall tied the game at 35-35 early in the second half, the Lady Bulldogs went on a 9-2 run to take a 45-37 lead with 15:10 to play. The Jackets were able to chip away at the UGA lead, but the Lady Bulldogs extended their lead back and earned their largest lead of the day, 12, at 63-51 with 6:47 to play.
The Yellow Jackets, who came from down seven with 1:03 to play last year against North Carolina, tried for a similar comeback after a Jasmine Hassell layup gave Georgia an 11 point lead with 2:28 to play.
Walthour hit her second three of the game and Chelsea Regins added a tip-in to pull Tech back within three, 71-68, with 32.9 seconds to play. Georgia, which had gone cold from the line in the previous two minutes, made its free throws down the stretch to ice the game for the Lady Bulldogs.
Georgia Tech will be off until next Sunday, when the Jackets travel to Murfreesboro, Tenn., to face the Middle Tennessee State Blue Raiders at 3 p.m. EST at the Charles M. Murphy Athletic Center. The game can be heard on WREK 91.1 FM and can be seen on ESPN3.com.
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— RamblinWreck.com –
