Lady Frogs Score 105 In 4OT Thriller Over Utah

TCU 105 Utah 96

Whoever decided to put last night’s TCU-Utah women’s basketball game on CBS College Sports must have had a premonition. And I’m glad I got to see it.

It almost didn’t happen though. Utah’s Halie Sawyer had the game in her hands, shooting free throws with half a second left in the first overtime. Had she made both, the Utes would have walked away with the victory. But only one went through the hoop. With the miss, the Lady Frogs were given another life.

With the second overtime winding down, TCU’s Emily Carter, a very good 86 percent free throw shooter, just had to get the ball to the bucket twice for a probable TCU victory. But only one went clean through the netting, ending the second overtime tied at 80 apiece,

A 3-pointer by Helena Sverrisdottir and a layup by TK LaFleur gave TCU an early 85-80 advantage in the third overtime. But the Utes closed the gap to just two before Eboni Mangum connected from long range to put the Lady Frogs up by 5 again. Mangum scored a career-high 25 points, eight more than her previous high. But Utah’s Kalee Whipple, who had 45 points and 7 3-pointers, answered with a 3 of her own, once again putting the Lady Frog lead at just one field goal. Free throws would give TCU a 90-87 edge, but Utah gave the ball to its WNBA prospect Whipple for a last-second 3-point attempt. She landed it to deadlock the score at 90.

A 3-pointer 12 seconds into the fourth overtime put the Utes up. But tired players willing to foul and the resulting free throws would help the Lady Frogs tremendously during the final five minutes. Following an Eboni Mangum shot, Sverrisdottir went 2 of 2 at the line and was 4 of 4 on foul shots in the final overtime. So was Carter, who stood at the line to give the Lady Frogs their final 2 points in a 105-96 victory.

Mangum (25), Carter (25), Sverrisdottir (21), LaFleur (19) and Starr Crawford (12) all finished in double figures. Sverrisdottir, Carter and Mangum played more than 50 minutes each in a game where the overtimes amounted to an extra half.

With this more than hard-fought victory, the Lady Frogs improve to 18-5 and 8-2 in the Mountain West Conference while the Utes fall to 13-9 and 4-5 in conference play.