Tampa, FL (December 30, 2005) ? University of South Florida head women's basketball coach Jose Fernandez has made no secret of the fact that that he wants to play against the best non-conference teams in the country. Well, today No. 3 ranked Louisiana State University showed the Bulls that it was just that ? one of the best teams in America ? and why it has been to two consecutive NCAA Division I Final Four's.
The Lady Tigers (10-0, 1-0 SEC) dominated the Bulls on both ends of the floor en route to an 87-44 win snapping USF's four-game winning streak.
LSU jumped out to a 6-0 lead as six-foot-six All-American center Sylvia Fowles scored the Lady Tigers' first six points and never looked back. The Bulls would cut the lead to three (8-5) after a lay-up by Nalini Miller (Capital Heights, MD) and a three-pointer by All-America Candidate Jessica Dickson (Ocala, FL) but would never get any closer the remainder of the game.
The Lady Tigers would then use a 19-0 run from the 14:10 mark to the 7:02 mark of the first half. USF would eventually score its first field goal with 6:44 left before the intermission ? a stretch of seven minutes and 16 seconds.
LSU would take a commanding 48-17 lead into the locker room at the half on the heals of a 70.8 percent shooting performance (17-24) from the field in the first stanza.
The Lady Tigers would come out in the second half and not let up extending their lead to a game-high 49 points, 71-22, with 10:36 remaining in the game en route to the win.
“We just didn't play well,” said USF head coach Jose Fernandez. “They led from the very beginning. LSU came out and missed just five shots in the first 16 minutes of the ball game. It's very simple; when you play the No. 3 team in the country you can't shoot the ball as poorly as we did today in the first half. They are just very deep in all spots and very talented at every position.”
Fowles would finish the game with a game-high 24 points and 13 rebounds while Quianna Chaney added 18 for LSU. Reigning National Player of the Year Seimone Augustus scored 11 points in the loss.
Shantia Grace (Sarasota, FL) led the Bulls with 16 points, including 13 in the second half, and Parsons would finish with 14 points. Dickson, the nation's leading scorer averaging 26.5 points per game coming into the contest, finished the game with 11 points and a team high seven rebounds.
“I though LSU did a great job on Jessica Dickson,” said Fernandez. “Jessica comes in as the leading scorer in the country and when you don't have an inside presence they were able to double-team Jessica every time she caught it. They did a very good job on her defensively.
USF will bet back to work on Monday night at 7 p.m. when it travels to Miami to face Florida International.
