University of Florida All-American Vanessa Hayden surely made an impression on WNBA Vice President of Player Personnel Renee Brown, who witnessed the 6-foot-4 senior power the Gators past South Carolina 61-56 Thursday night in the O'Connell Center.
Hayden posted her 12th double-double of the season and the 45th of her career by recording 28 points and 17 rebounds in 29 minutes of action, guiding UF to a 13-5 overall record and a 3-2 mark in Southeastern Conference play.
"Vanessa is playing some tremendous basketball right now," said Florida head coach Carolyn Peck, who was celebrating her 38th birthday. "She is playing like a senior."
Hayden finished the night one rebound shy of the 1,000th of her career, as she is on pace to become just the fifth different Gator to record 1,000 career points and rebounds.
"Vanessa's a great player. Not only was she able to catch and score, but she works very hard to get second shot opportunities," South Carolina head coach Susan Walvius said. "She had a great game. We would have two or three people on her and she could turn around and score and shoot over people. That's tough to defend."
Also in double figures for Florida was Tashia Morehead and Bernice Mosby, who recorded 10 and 11 points respectively for the Gators, who committed 23 turnovers in the game, but benefited from a commanding 43-27 rebounding advantage.
Cristina Ciocan led the Gamecocks (8-8, 0- SEC) with 16 points, while Iva Sliskovic added 14.
The Gators held a 33-32 halftime advantage, but both teams struggled to score after intermission, exchanging turnovers in the opening moments of the second half. Hayden started the scoring by making her presence felt down low. The Gamecocks used a combination of gritty defense and timely shooting to pull even, and then take the lead at the 14-minute mark thanks to a 7-0 run. When Hayden made yet another bucket inside, this time against three South Carolina players, Florida tied the game at 39 and then took the lead 41-39 when Morehead hit a driving lay-up off a Florida fast break. Morehead followed with a jumper to extend the lead to four until USC responded with a 5-0 run to take the lead, 44-43.
A Hayden basket put Florida on top 45-44 but once again the Gamecocks responded with some key baskets capitalized by a Sarah Burgess three from the top of the key that gave South Carolina 49-47 lead. Hayden responded with another bucket inside to close the gap to two with seven minutes remaining.
South Carolina hit another three to extend its lead to five but Florida would respond again with a bucket from Hayden inside, a Danielle Santos jumper, and steal and lay-up by Sarah Lowe to put the Gators on top, 53-52. Another Ciocan three-pointer for the Gamecocks put the visitors on top by two until Hayden answered again to tie the score at 55 with four minutes remaining. Baskets by Morehead and Hayden contributed to a 59-56 lead going into the closing moments of the game.
With pressure defense, the Gamecocks gained possession and called timeout with a little over 12 seconds on the clock to set their strategy for what would probably be their last offensive possession of the game. South Carolina passed in the ball near their bench and found Kelly Morrone for an open but deep three-pointer that found the back of the iron and fell into the waiting arms of Hayden for her 17th rebound on the night. The All-American then added two points at the charity stripe to secure the 61-56 win for Florida.
"You have to be proud of these Gators," Peck said. "They kept fighting back. This is a good South Carolina team but we kept fighting back. This was important to convince this team we can compete in the SEC. It's going to be a battle every night."
South Carolina opened the game's scoring with a three from Cristina Ciocan. Florida responded with a 9-0 run in which Hayden dominated. The senior center camped out under the Gamecock basket as her teammates continued to find her. South Carolina responded with a 12-5 run of its own and survived a stretch that saw Hayden block two shots and draw a charging foul.
With South Carolina clinging to a 15-14 lead Mosby provided some instance offense off the bench, which Coach Peck has come to expect from her sophomore forward. With Hayden on the bench the offense flowed through Mosby until Hayden returned at the 9:00 mark. South Carolina stayed in the game with some sharp shooting from behind the arc and would take their third lead of the game 20-18 at the 8:12 mark using the their shooting touch from the outside to neutralize Hayden's shot blocking inside.
The two teams would trade leads until Mosby hit three of her nine first half points to give the Gators a 29-28 lead, a lead that Florida would not relinquish for the final four minutes of the first half. Florida headed to the locker room leading 33-32.
Postgame quotes
Florida
Head Coach Carolyn Peck:
On the game overall:
"South Carolina is a much better team than their record in the conference demonstrates. They've got weapons. They found different ways to score from shooting the three to the hi-low game. Defensively, they were able to mix up things on us to throw us off balance and make us read a little bit, which slowed down our transition game down at first. I think our team demonstrated a lot of maturity because they didn't lose their composure and that's extremely important in the SEC because team's are going to make runs."
On Danielle Santos' defensive effort:
"She's a stopper on defense. A lot of times she attracts the toughest defensive assignment on the perimeter. Tonight, I think it was a team defensive effort. Danielle went the distance and she's very smart and tenacious. She's textbook when it comes to defense and she anticipates well. She is only going to get better."
Senior Vanessa Hayden:
On the team's toughness in the final minutes:
"I think this team has learned from the beginning of the season. We're not going to beat everybody by 50 points, so we have to be tough and we have to play hard all the time and I think we've learned that. We beat each other up in practice and I think that carries over to the games. We've worked really hard lately on being aggressive and working hard in the paint and it's paid off tremendously."
South Carolina
Head Coach Susan Walvius:
On the final play of the game:
"We were down three, so we needed to take a three. We ran the play we wanted. We executed it well. Kelly Morrone is a money shooter for us and she's the person we went to. She took a good shot, but it just didn't fall."
On Florida's Vanessa Hayden:
"Vanessa's a great player. Not only was she able to catch and score, but she works very hard to get second shot opportunities. She had a great game. We would have two or three people on her and she could turn around and score and shoot over people. That's tough to defend. I think they did a great job of feeding her the basketball, she did a great job of finishing and she did a great job cleaning up the boards."
On Florida answering South Carolina's runs:
"We had a couple of lulls offensively in the game. One of the things we've gone to in practice is being aggressive yet patient. For the most part today, we did a good job of that. There were periods in this game when the score was close when I thought we got a little quick and tried to force some things that weren't there, but I'm pleased with the way we played offensively and I thought we did a good job, but Florida had an answer for everything we did today."
END OF REPORT
