Women’s basketball falls just short against top-ranked Connecticut, 75-71

By Steve Lansdale

AUSTIN, Texas — Transfer forward Jatarie White scored a team-high 18 points, guards Ariel Atkins and Brooke McCarty each added 14 and guard Lashann Higgs chipped in with 13, but it was not enough as the No. 9/7 University of Texas women’s basketball team fell, 75-71, to No. 1/1 Connecticut Monday in front of 11,877 at the Frank Erwin Center.

Texas head coach Karen Aston lauded the effort of her team, and said [s2If current_user_can(access_s2member_level2)]the tough loss against the perennial powerhouse Huskies will benefit her team as the season progresses.

“It came down to a possession game, which we will, for sure, learn some lessons from,” Aston said. “I thought there were some segments where we took some ill-advised shots, in which will look back on and understand more about our possessions and which shots to take.

“Before we got on the floor today, we talked about this game being a good opportunity to measure where we are and who we can be. As a coach, and as a fan of Texas basketball, you would hope that this group of girls is who they are all the time.”

The loss dropped the Longhorns’ record this season to 14-3, while the Huskies retained their perfect record, at 16-0.

Katie Lou Samuelson, the Huskies’ leading scorer, beat her season average by a point when she scored a game-high 19 points to lead Connecticut. Guards Kia Nurse and Crystal Dangerfield added 13 and 11 points, respectively.

Connecticut head coach Geno Auriemma said the Longhorns presented a formidable foe for his team, especially on the road.

“From my vantage point, we just made a couple ofplays down the stretch and d just enough to win the game,” Auriemma said. “(The Longhorns) are a really good team to play against, especially (in Austin). We’re just so undersized in so many positions and they just manhandled us in the first half, I thought we did a much better job in the second half. We rebounded better, and we were a little bit more aggressive.”

Texas led, 24-21 after the first period, and trailed by a single point, 49-48, going into the locker room at halftime.

Aston echoed Auriemma’s sentiment that the difference in the second half — and ultimately in the game — was minute.

“In the second half, UConn started shading our players a bit more,” Aston said. “I think we had some open looks throughout the game that we didn’t make. Both teams shot in the 40s (field goal percentage), both defenses were pretty solid, yet they made more free throws than we did.”

There are those who might find a silver lining in playing the team universally recognized as the nation’s best to such a close score. McCarty, however, is one of those for whom the result, even against Connecticut, was a letdown.

“Of course,” McCarty said. “We are competitors, so every time you lose, I mean, it kind of stings you a little bit. But at the same time, I think that it was a good growing point for us, and showed us what we can do.

“So I think now, going into practice every day, we can kind of use this as an example, and then when we are in those moments where we don’t feel like practicing or we don’t feel like going hard, or something like that, we can use that and say, ‘hey look, are we going to be who we are, or are we going to take a step back?’”

Like McCarty, Aston does not relish in close-but-no-cigar results, even against national heavyweights like Connecticut. But the Longhorns’ coach said after the game that she was not surprised that her team matched up so well against the team that has become the nation’s standard in the sport.

“I definitely thought that we would show up, going into the game,” Aston said. “I thought we looked like a team that wanted to play differently. Our group is easy to read, in the sense that you can tell if they’re ready to play or not. I wasn’t surprised that we played well, because we prepared very well.”

UT returns to the Big 12 portion of its schedule Saturday when it faces Texas Tech in Lubbock at 3 p.m. in a game that can be seen on FSN.

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