JMU Women “Upset” Gonzaga in NCAA Tournament!

The 11th seeded JMU Women’s team beat 6th seeded Gonzaga 72-63 tonight to earn the program’s first win in the Big Dance since 1991.  Needless to say, we couldn’t be happier for a program that has been a consistent winner and one of the best representations of everything we all love about JMU since former Dukes men’s star Kenny Brooks took over. The team and its dedicated supporters (including of course the Pep Band) have developed a bit of an indie/hipster/cult cache the last half-decade or so with their consistent challenging of big programs, epic battles between the Dawn Evans-led JMU squads and the DelleDonne-led Delaware squads, and of course a couple of deep runs in the WNIT. In case you haven’t been in on this, Start Wearing Purple didn’t start in football or men’s hoops, but rather during the WNIT run a few years back. But we’re guessing those in the know both inside and outside the program won’t mind needing to find a bunch more seats on the bandwagon as they get ready for Tuesday’s matchup with #3 seed (and hosting team) Texas A&M. We also loved seeing all the Twitter shoutouts to the program from former Dukes greats all over the place including but not limited to Arthur Moats, Akeem Jordan, Dawn Evans, Tamera Young, Pierre Curtis, Steve Buckhantz, and Devon Moore.

On the game, here’s the story through our eyes (though you can certainly find a much more knowledgeable account over at the JMU WBB Fan Blog).  The Dukes played a solid, smart first half in which they overcome a slow shooting start from CAA POY Kirby Burkholder to lead by three at the half.  Then they played basically 10-14 minutes of some of their worst, most inconsistent, sloppy ball of the season to start the second half. They seemed to turn the ball over every other possession and at one point were in a 3-28 shooting slump.  Then, out of nowhere, they just turned back into the dominant team we’ve seen all season! Part of it was definitely Coach Brooks’ decision to risk putting some foul-laden players back in the game a little earlier than he would’ve liked.  At the time, the Dukes were really struggling with Gonzaga’s pressure and he just couldn’t wait.  The gamble paid off as JMU went on a huge run to turn a small deficit into a relatively comfortable final minute.

Baller.

Burkholder – what can we even say?! If you have a kid and you want them to understand how to be a truly great player, have them watch this game.  Even conference players of the year have terrible shooting nights occasionally (4-17 probably qualifies). But you know what they do, or at least what Kirby did?  She found every other way imaginable to take over a basketball game even without knocking down shots. Outside shot not falling? Get to the line and knock ’em down (17-18). Forget that you’re just a guard and hit the boards (18(!) rebounds). Get steals in crunchtime, set up teammates for easy buckets, and smile the whole time! Just a virtuoso performance.

Lastly, we’d like to point out the truly fantastic work from the ESPN announcing team of Carter Blackburn (@CarterBlackburn) and Rosalyn Gold-Onwude (@ROSGO21). After so much ratchet CAA coverage, it was incredibly refreshing to have a team that had clearly taken the job seriously, embedded themselves with both teams for a couple days, and seemed to truly enjoy the opportunity to cover the game.  Shoutouts to past greats from both programs (including Tamera Young and Dawn Evans from JMU), explanations of “Nicki said No!” and “You. Got. Kirby’d!,” and a reference to the closeness of the team and the pep band.  Sure hope we get that team again Tuesday. Let’s Go Dukes!