Monday, March 29, 2010

Jocks' worst nightmare

In the women's tourny, Xavier had THREE opportunities to upset heavily favored Stanford in the closing seconds. First, with a two point lead, their best free throw shooter had a one and one, a chance to make it a two possession game -- and blew the first, Stanford getting the rebound and going on to tie. Then -- and the tape of this is incredible -- on an inbounds play with the game tied, a Xavier player found herself virtually alone under the basket, got the ball -- and missed! Incredibly, Xavier got the rebound and the same player again got free UNDER THE BASKET and missed a second time! With 4+ seconds, Stanford got the ball and a player went the distance and just got a layup off before the buzzer, Stanford wins by 2.

I've never seen a team blow a game so many times in so few closing seconds. How will the two players ever live this down? Xavier has never been to a final four .... and came oh so close tonight. They should have won the game, 3 times. Talk about nerves taking over and ruining your focus.


Xavier's Dee Dee Jernigan missed two wide-open layins in the closing 12 seconds that likely would have sent the Musketeers to San Antonio for their first Final Four.
"I was too anxious," Jernigan said. "It was like a kid in a candy store. I was too open and didn't think it was coming out."

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