The Alabama women’s basketball team lives to dance another day after taking down the Florida State Seminoles 82-74 on Friday in the first round of the NCAA women’s basketball tournament in Austin, Texas.
The win was brought home by forward Essence Cody, who scored a career-high 20 points with a 66.6% field goal percentage and more than doubled her average rebounds per game with 14. This performance gave Cody her third double-double of the season.
“Essence has grown up a lot this year,” guard Loyal McQueen said. “We need her to be aggressive every single night. We need her to be on the boards every night for us to be big-time teams. Essence can be great. I mean, we all know it and we all see it. So, I’m excited for many more career highs to come.”
With guard Jessica Timmons announcing a season-ending knee injury, guard Karly Weathers needed to step in to take her place. Weathers fell right into the offensive firepower of the Crimson Tide, scoring a season-high 18 points.
Alongside this forward-guard duo was guard Aaliyah Nye, who scored 18 points of her own, changing up her tactics a bit. Instead of leading with her nationally ranked 3-point shot, she felt out more field goals, going 42.1% from the field, but sinking only two 3-pointers.
Although guard Sarah Ashlee Barker has been a key component in most of the team’s wins this season, she played very little after finding herself in deep foul trouble early in Friday’s game. She fouled out late in the fourth quarter after scoring only 6 points, but as her teammates battled, Alabama stayed afloat despite the foul trouble.
“She [Barker] is a vocal leader for us, and we knew we had to pick her up, so I think everybody came in and did their job,” Nye said. “Karly Weathers, Burg [Del’Janae ‘Burger’ Williams], Loyal, Essence, we all just came together, and we went to win, and I think everyone played their game today.”
Despite its ending, the game was mostly back and forth. Florida State quickly took a small lead that was deemed insurmountable till the third quarter.
Alabama fell to a 7-point deficit toward the end of the first quarter but brought the deficit to 4 points after ending the first quarter with a last-second buzzer-beater from Nye.
Coming out of the first quarter, the Crimson Tide kept up with Florida State, shrinking the gap to only 1 point after a 3-pointer from Cody. From then on, the teams seemed to go run for run.
By the end of the first half, the teams were tied at 40-40. The second half started with a 6-point run by Alabama, from three layups by Cody and McQueen, but this didn’t go unanswered as Florida State came back with 6 points of its own.
“Today’s game was a game of runs,” head coach Kristy Curry said. “I thought we were really good being able to weather their runs and make sure ours were just a couple of plays longer.”
As the time dwindled for the third quarter, Alabama began to move faster, bagging an 8-point run. Despite their attempts, the Seminoles couldn’t keep up, and Alabama found a 12-point lead.
As the team’s lead climbed to 13 points, many Alabama fans headed to the exit, as victory was ever so near. Still, Florida State managed a late-stage comeback to bring the game within 2 points with just over two minutes left. With a jumper by Williams, Nye’s final 3-pointer of the night, and five free throws, Alabama secured its spot to dance another day.
With this win, Alabama will advance to play No. 1-seeded Texas on Sunday on its home court.
