Dec. 20, 2007

Complete Box Score in PDF Format

Box Score

FT. MYERS, Fla. - Led by a career-high 29 points from junior guard Paris Leonard and a full-court press that Memphis unveiled for the first time this season, the Lady Tiger basketball team (3-7) advanced to the championship game of the FGCU Holiday Classic with an 86-79 win Thursday.

"Our press really did this for us tonight," Head Coach Blair Savage-Lansden said. "It gave us energy and helped us keep up our defensive intensity. When we got out of the press, we got a little soft in the half court, but we gritted it out and got great production from a number of different players to advance to the championship game tomorrow."

In addition to the full-court press, the Lady Tigers unveiled a new starting line-up which included Latoya Bullard and Jessica Jackson for the first time this season. That line-up still had its hands full with the three-point shooting of Maggie McCloskey. McCloskey, one of the top five three-point shooters in NCAA Division I last year, helped power Loyola out to a 10-4 lead behind a pair of threes. But Memphis answered back with a jumper from Jackson and a steal and a layup from Paris Leonard that started a 17-4 Memphis run.

But the pesky Ramblers battled back, again using three-point shooting to pull back from a six-point deficit to tie the game at 24 all with 7:04 to play. From there, the two teams were not able to separate from one another, as Loyola drew a pair of late Lady Tiger fouls and converted from the free-throw line to pull ahead 38-37, but with 5.5 seconds remaining in the half, Bullard drove the length of the court and hit a soft floater as the clock expired to send Memphis to the locker room up 39-38.

Three different times in the second half, Memphis pressed the lead out to 11 points. But each time, the Ramblers answered with a run of their own, as McCloskey hit a three with a defender in her face to cut what was a 72-61 Memphis lead to just nine with 5:28 to play. Loyola would convert three-point plays the hard way the rest of the night, as Keisha Collins hit a layup and converted the free-throw to cut the deficit to just five at 74-69 with 4:26 to play.

Memphis answered back with its own impressive performance from the free-throw line, as Ashley Thornton knocked down a pair of free-throws to pull the lead out to seven, but McCluskey got loose again, knocking down another three, trimming the Memphis lead to 78-74 with 2:36 to play. But Memphis took advantage of a pair of Rambler turnovers on the Loyola end of the floor to protect possession of the basketball and to earn trips to the free-throw line. In the final three minutes, Memphis was 6-for-9 to seal the 86-79 win and to snap a three-game losing streak that dated back to the championship game of the Lady Tigers' own Thanksgiving tournament against Louisiana Tech.

Leonard led all players with 29 points, including 4-for-6 shooting from three-point range. She added seven rebounds and four steals in 33 minutes in the win. Ashley Thornton fell just short of her fourth double-double of the season, finishing with 15 points and nine rebounds. Latoya Bullard also fell just short of a double-double, finishing with nine points and 10 assists, while adding three steals in 39 minutes of play.

Elyse VanBogaert led Loyola with 26 points on 10-of-14 shooting, as she was on the receiving end of a lot of high-low looks for Loyola. McCloskey finished with 21 points on 7-for-11 shooting from three-point range.

Memphis will face the winner of the Florida Gulf Coast/Texas-Pan American game at approximately 7:00 p.m. (ET), Friday.