HARTFORD, Conn. – With two minutes remaining in the Syracuse women’s basketball team’s first round Big East tournament game against Boston College, Julie McBride sat on the bench staring blankly ahead. Her team trailed by 25 points. Director of Basketball Operations Amy Reckner tried to console the senior guard. Nothing, though, could console McBride with all the losses she’s witnessed this season.

Well, maybe McBride can take solace in one thing: It’s the last SU loss she’ll have to witness, at least as a player. In a season full of blowout losses, it’s no surprise that the Orangewomen’s season ended as it did, with a 64-36 loss to the Eagles on Saturday at the Hartford Civic Center. SU finished its year on a 13-game losing streak. It marks the second straight season that Syracuse hasn’t advanced past the first round of the tournament.

Just a week ago, BC defeated Syracuse by a much slimmer margin, 59-52. Three major differences contributed to the larger margin of defeat. The first was the presence of point guard Amber Jacobs, who missed the first meeting with a sore shoulder. The senior scored 13 points but SU head coach Keith Cieplicki said her constant penetration into the lane opened up opportunities for other players.

‘Anyone who watched both games could tell the difference Amber Jacobs made was significant,’ Cieplicki said. ‘You’re talking about the difference between a First Team All-Big East player and a freshman (Sarah Marshall). From a seven-point game at Manley to pretty much a blowout today, that’s difference a great player makes.’

The second major difference was the pace of the game. Last week the Orangewomen effectively slowed tempo, often taking half the shot clock just to bring the ball up court. On Saturday, BC employed a press eight minutes into the game. While, McBride said the press didn’t necessarily change the pace of the game, the problems it created for the Orangewomen were obvious, including forcing 17 turnovers. Cieplicki described the game pace as ‘medium,’ as opposed to the slow pace he prefers.

At times it appeared that the 5-foot-4 McBride couldn’t see over the top of the press. In the last collegiate game of her career, she committed a team-high six turnovers. Eagles’ coach Cathy Inglese said she forced her team to focus on McBride. Like many opposing teams have found out this season, as McBride goes, so go the Orangewomen. The strategy worked, as McBride scored just eight points on 3-of-14 shooting.

‘I’ve got to give Julie great credit,’ said Jacobs, who spent most of the game latched to McBride on the defensive end. ‘At the beginning, I needed to get a feel how to guard her. After that, we just wanted to deny her the ball once she got rid of it. We wanted to make them pass to someone else. The team runs around Julie.’

Boston College also dictated play down low and dominated the Orangewomen on the boards, an area that has been an Achilles’ heel for SU all season long. Last week, SU outrebounded the Eagles, 30-27. Saturday, though, was a completely different story as the Eagles grabbed a 41-22 advantage on the boards, including a 14-7 advantage of the offensive glass. As has been the case for much of the season, the Orangewomen gave up so many rebounds because of their poor shooting performance. SU shot only 29.5 percent, including 13 percent from 3-point range.

‘We just gave them too many chances last game,’ Inglese said. ‘We gave them a lot of long rebounds. We just knew this time if they’re going to slow it down, we’re only going to give them once chance.’

With McBride on the bench for the game’s final two minutes, SU fans caught a glimpse of what the Orangewomen might look like next season without the program’s all-time points and assists leader. Fortunately, Cieplicki has a recruiting class coming in next season ranked No. 24 in the country by the Blue Star Index. It includes a point guard, Mary Joe Riley, who Cieplicki hopes can fill McBride’s spot – a task Cieplicki knows will be next to impossible.

‘She’ll be playing in a park next Tuesday,’ Cieplicki said. ‘I just would have liked to-and I know she would have liked to – win some more games.’

Published on March 5, 2004 at 12:00 pm