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Bulls Reach WNIT Title Game

The Associated Press

South Florida center Jessica Lawson celebrates with her teammates after a women's NIT tournament semifinal.

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By JERRY SPAR

Tribune correspondent

Published: April 2, 2009

CHESTNUT HILL, Mass. - Having conquered their issues with space, the University of South Florida is headed to the final frontier of the WNIT.

Behind a second-half barrage of 3-pointers, the Bulls blew past Boston College 82-65 Wednesday night to earn a spot in the championship game of the WNIT. They will play at Kansas on Saturday at 2 p.m.

"We're a second-half team," said Janae Stokes, who scored a game-high 22 points and hit all five of her 3-pointers after the break. "We had better spacing. In the first half we were sitting on top of each other. We spaced the floor and took advantage of our quickness over their guards. And got the ball to the people that were on."

Coach Jose Fernandez concurred: "We spread the floor more. That's why we got those looks."

After going 1-for-8 from behind the arc in the first half, the Bulls (26-10) hit six of their first seven treys in the second half. They turned a 32-28 halftime deficit into a 48-44 lead with 12:58 remaining after Jasmine Wynne (19 points) connected from downtown.

Leading 50-49 with 9:54 left, USF went on a 15-1 run that started with a Wynne 3-pointer and ended with a pair of treys from Stokes 20 seconds apart. That made it 65-50 with 6:51 left. The lead was never less than 11 points the rest of the way.

"We think we're a second-half team," Wynne said. "Being in this tournament, being one and done, you don't ever want it to be your last 20 minutes. We just go out and fight like we want to play another 40 minutes the next day."

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