Women’s basketball captures conference crown and goes dancing

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Women’s basketball captures conference crown and goes dancing

Womens Basketball 2010 Empire 8 Championship

“the stakes were very different this time. This is what they worked for all year long, and if we don’t win that game, our season is over.”

It was described by some as a one-in-a-million shot.

Utica women’s basketball head coach Michele Davis maintains it is a staple of her team’s offense. “We’ve run it – and won on it – numerous times. Heck, we run it probably five times or 10 times a game,” Davis says.

The Pioneers were trailing Ithaca 37-36 with 1.3 seconds to go. Inbounding from the baseline, Stephanie Nara ’12 lobbed a pass to Jessica Berry ’12, who was positioned in the low post, just in front of the rim and immediately behind center Meghan Fiore ’14. Berry caught the ball, took one step toward the rim, and forced up a buzzer-beating shot.

What made the play special – if not one-in-a-million – to everyone gathered inside Ben Light Gymnasium on February 27 were the stakes at hand. Utica College and top-seeded and host Ithaca College were meeting in the Empire 8 Championship Tournament final. At stake, in addition to the conference crown, was a trip to the NCAA Tournament.

However many times the team has run the play in practice or in games, Davis allows, “It’s still a very difficult shot to make.”

“And,” she continues, “the stakes were very different this time. This is what they worked for all year long, and if we don’t win that game, our season is over.”

Berry punched the Pioneers ticket. Her last-second heroics earned UC its second conference championship and accompanying automatic NCAA bid in three years, and cemented her case for All-American honors.

UC carried its resilience onto the big stage. The Pioneers opened their NCAA tournament play facing tall odds. Nationally-No. 8 ranked Moravian College was riding the momentum of a 20-game winning streak, had the nation’s sixth highest-scoring offense, and were playing on their home court, where they had lost only once this season. The Pioneers overcame a 15-point second half deficit to advance to the tournament’s second round for the first time since 1984.

Davis owes her team’s knack for coming from behind to the character in the Pioneers locker room, namely the players’ commitment to playing hard until, literally, the final buzzer.

“We were down in a lot of games this year, and we consistently fought back,” says Davis, who, with the team’s victory over Moravian, set the program record for coaching wins, passing Joan Kay. “There are negatives to playing from behind as often as we did – certainly, you always want to be ahead – but we never quit. If we were down 15 at the half, their attitude was always, ‘Well, we can outscore them by 20 in the second half.’ They never felt like any game was over – ever.”

Of course, it never hurts to have a player of Berry’s caliber. The Empire 8 Player of the Year, D3hoops.com All-American, and Women’s Basketball Coaches Association All-American finalist ranked 11th in the nation in scoring this season. Her conference-best 21.3 scoring average was 6 points better than the second ranked scorer. She also
finished second in the Empire 8 in rebounds.

Berry is one of only nine players in the College’s history to score more than 1,000 points, and her 1,549 points currently ranked third of UC’s all-time scoring list. She also ranks second all-time with 111 blocked shots and fourth all-time with 791 rebounds. She needs 209 rebounds next season to join fellow UC All-American Sharon Lyke ’85 as the second player in program history with more than 1,000 points and 1,000 rebounds in a career. In addition, she is on pace to become only the 11th player in Division III women’s basketball history to score more than 2,000 points and have 1,000 rebounds.

“Jess is that kind of once-in-coaching-lifetime player who you’re going to get,” Davis says. “Joan Kay had one in Sharon Lyke, and I think Jess Berry may end up being my Sharon Lyke. They don’t come around a lot. “It’s fun to watch her play, and it’s got to be fun to play with her because she’s not a selfish player. She doesn’t have a lot of weaknesses. She can shoot the three. She can drive to the basket. She can play with her back to the basket. She can hit baseline jump shots. And, of course, she’ll take and hit the big shot.”