By Seth Doria
Arizona Daily Wildcat
March 24, 1998

Senior women upset by last game effort

DAYTON, Ohio- When UA's women's basketball team lost to Connecticut Saturday, many people realized it was the end of an era.

Marte Alexander, Adia Barnes, Mikko Giordano, DeAngela Minter, Amber Phoenix and Cha-Ron Walker all played their last game for the Wildcats.

And while the program's progress has been well documented, it is important to realize just how much the group revolutionized Arizona basketball.

The current class of seniors set records in virtually every major statistical category, including career scoring, rebounding, blocks, steals, games played and games started.

"They (the senior class) set the benchmark for Arizona basketball," UA head coach Joan Bonvicini said. "They gave everything they had and that's all you can ask for."

But after the game, Arizona players and coaches were more concerned with their worst loss of the season than with looking back to appreciate the school's best season ever (23-7) and what they did for the program.

"It's so hard to think about the entire season when it ends like that," Barnes said. "Nothing went well (Saturday)."

Bonvicini said it would be a while before she could look back with fond eyes on the season.

"I will," she said, "but it's hard right now."

Perhaps the most disappointing thought for the players was not that their Arizona careers were over, but also how they went out.

While the team had been characterized all season by its pressure defense that led to an incredibly effective transition game, Saturday saw Connecticut's defense take control of the game.

Take these statistics as examples:

UConn outscored Arizona 36-22 in the paint and scored 14 points off turnovers while the Wildcats managed only eight. Even more telling were the points on fast breaks as UConn had 17 to the UA's seven.

Arizona's field goal shooting in the second half was a woeful 10 for 38 (26 percent).

The 17-point loss was also the second worst this season after a 108-90 drubbing at Stanford Feb. 28. The Wildcats' three losses prior to that in the Pacific 10 Conference were by a total of nine points.

"They overpowered us," Bonvicini said. "We just weren't ourselves (Saturday).

"Connecticut did an outstanding job running and executing their offense. It was tough playing catch up the entire time."

Barnes, who is by far the most productive woman to ever play basketball at the McKale Center, was not her usual self.

She did rack up 17 points and 11 rebounds, but Barnes never took control of the game as she usually did when Arizona was not playing well.

"I was frustrated with myself because I felt I had a lot of good looks at the basket, but I just wasn't converting," she said. "And the times we could take advantage of the way they were playing, we didn't capitalize."