Spartans put end to KU women’s season

By Tom Keegan     Mar 28, 2008

Nick Krug
Kansas guard Sade Morris has her shot bounced off of her face by Michigan State center Lauren Aitch. The Jayhawks lost, 58-54, Thursday in East Lansing, Mich.

? Snow was falling Thursday night outside the Breslin Center, but layups weren’t falling inside for the Kansas University women’s basketball team.

Michigan State defeated the Jayhawks, 58-54, to put an end to their season in a WNIT game witnessed by 3,139 spectators, including KU Chancellor Robert Hemenway and Cindy Self, who will be cheering even harder for her husband’s team tonight, 90 miles to the east.

Danielle McCray, using her blend of strength and quickness, kept Kansas in the game with 18 points, nine rebounds, eight steals and two blocked shots.

A 5-foot-11 sophomore from Olathe, McCray left quite an impression on Michigan State coach Suzy Merchant.

“Her power is so impressive,” Merchant said. “It doesn’t matter if she has the ball on the block or in the corner, or if she has it at the three-point line, her ability to create shots for herself based on her strength and her power is really impressive. She’s a WNBA player, a WNBA guard. The stuff they run for her is tough to defend. It seems like every time you look at the stat sheet, it’s 18 or 20, and it’s a quiet 18 or 20 because she takes good shots.”

McCray didn’t get enough help to extend the postseason for the Jayhawks (17-16), who had defeated Evansville in Allen Fieldhouse to advance to the Sweet 16 of the WNIT. Michigan State (21-13) next plays chief rival Michigan.

On a night it played strong defense and played extremely hard, Kansas had 22 turnovers, watched too many layups trickle off the rim and lost the battle of the bigs.

Michigan State’s 6-9 sophomore Allyssa DeHaan contributed 16 points, seven rebounds and four blocked shots, made four of five free throws and appeared to make KU’s 6-5 freshman Krysten Boogaard (10 points, five rebounds, four of 12 field goals) rush some of her shots.

Sade Morris also had difficulty converting aggressive drives to the hoop into points. Morris misfired on all but one of 11 shot attempts.

The Spartans advanced despite shooting just .345 from the field and .231 from beyond the arc and getting edged on the boards, 39-37.

“I don’t think we played very well offensively, but you have to give Kansas a lot of credit,” Merchant said. “They really get up in you, and they really deny and pressure the wing passes. We don’t see that night in and night out as much in the Big Ten as you see the in the Big 12. … I really thought they were one of the toughest teams that we played in terms of intensity, in terms of focus, in terms of being powerful to the rim. They’ve got a good inside-outside game. I thought we would definitely have our hands full tonight, and we did.”

Kansas used an 8-2 run at the start of the second half to take a 32-28 lead with 15:34 left. McCray’s layup with 7:31 left gave KU its final lead, 43-42. A pair of McCray free throws pulled Kansas within three points with 2:18 left, but Michigan State went on a 6-2 tear to take a seven-point lead with 11 seconds left.

Kansas coach Bonnie Henrickson expressed gratitude for the opportunity to play in the WNIT.

“I think if you tell any coach in America, ‘Hey, for Christmas we’re going to give you two more weeks of practice after the season,’ most of us would say, ‘Well, I don’t need anything else. That’s all I want,'” Henrickson said.

KU’s next appearance in front of spectators, at Late Night in the Phog, will draw more interest than most years because it will mark the first chance to see Angel Goodrich, the highly regarded point guard recruit out of Oklahoma.

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