FSU Women Make History, Advance to ACC Championship

The FSU women’s basketball team entered its ACC Tournament semifinal game against the Louisville Cardinals looking to earn a spot in what would be the first ACC Tournament final in program history. Early in their matchup against Louisville, FSU looked like they were on a collision course with Notre Dame in the finals of the ACC Tournament, jumping out to an early 22-4 lead and extending that lead to as much as 23 when they led 37-14 with 4:09 to go in the first half. However, the Cardinals ended the first half on a 12-2 run, cutting the lead to 39-26 and taking the momentum into halftime. Louisville carried that momentum into the second half as well, holding the Seminoles to just 2 field goals in the first 12 minutes of the second half. In the end though, the Cardinals went cold at the wrong moment and did not have enough left in their tanks to catch Florida State, which pulled away in the end for a 66-51 win.

This was the second matchup this season between the Seminoles and the Cardinals and this second matchup was a mirror image of the first– to a scary degree. The first matchup took place in Tallahassee on January 22nd. In that game, the ‘Noles jumped out to a 21-1 lead before letting the Cardinals come all the way back into the game, capped off by a 60-54 Louisville lead with just 6 minutes left. It took a late comeback to take the win back from the Cardinals as the ‘Noles won that one 68-63. The main difference between the 2 showdowns is that in today’s win, FSU let Louisville back into the game but never let them break even as the Cardinals trailed 45-43 but never got closer than that.

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Ivey Slaughter led all Seminoles in scoring with 17 points on 5-7 shooting and 7-10 from the free throw line. Slaughter added 5 rebounds and 3 blocks. Senior Maegan Conwright also added 12 points, including 2 clutch 3 pointers late in the game, and Shakayla Thomas had another double-digit performance off the bench, scoring 12.

If yesterday’s destruction of Virginia Tech showed that the Seminoles can win big when they are expected to, today’s close shave against Louisville showed the resiliency of a team that has not been challenged with many close games lately. Since February began, FSU has played 10 games, and all have been double-digit victories except for 1 loss and 1 single digit win. Entering the NCAA Tournament, the close game experience can do nothing but benefit the ‘Noles. Today’s win also showed just that these Seminoles are still human. FSU has outrebounded every opponent so far this season by a double-digit margin. Today, Florida State narrowly kept their rebounding streak alive, outrebounding the Cardinals 39-35.

With the win, the Seminoles have tied the program record for most wins in a season at 29 and have moved into their first ACC Tournament Final in program history. The championship will take place tomorrow at 1 PM when FSU takes on the Notre Dame Fighting Irish. In their 1st matchup this season, which took place in South Bend on January 2nd, the Fighting Irish beat the ‘Noles 74-68.