After a run in the Southern States Athletic Conference championship game, Loyola’s Lady Wolfpack narrowly missed being selected to the NAIA national tournament.
Eighteen teams are selected as automatic qualifiers for winning their conference tournament. There are also 14 at-large teams who are selected based on the top 25 rankings at the end of the regular season. Despite losing the conference championship game against Southern Polytechnic State University, head women’s basketball coach Kellie Kennedy thought Loyola had a chance to receive an at-large bid and was disappointed by the vote total they received. In the season’s last coaches’ poll, Loyola (20-12 overall, 6-6 in conference play) only received one vote from the coaches.
Loyola’s tournament resume was strengthened by the victories earned on their way to the SSAC championship game, however. Loyola beat two teams who are tournament-bound, handing losses to Shorter and Lee.
The victory against Lee was tightly contested and went into overtime. “It was a great game. Both teams played well,” said Kennedy. “But we never let up, and I don’t think our team at any point thought we were going to lose that game.”
In addition to being a confident group on that day, Kennedy gave the team credit for drawing fouls and hitting their free throws. Loyola shot 66.7 percent from the line that day, making 22 out of 33 foul shots. Guard Keiva Council hit the two biggest free throws of the game when she got fouled while driving the lane with 3.8 seconds.
The ‘Pack had no time to celebrate, because the free throws put Loyola up 72-70. The time left on the clock was enough for Lee to put together a play and get one more look at the basket. Lee guard Brooke Mckinnon, who led her team with 31 points that game, took the last shot of the game 14 feet out from the basket. “They got one last attempt at it. It was a pretty good attempt, but we defended and they didn’t make it,” said Kennedy.
Kennedy praised Council, who had 22 points in the contest, for her contributions throughout the season. “Keiva does so much for us,” she said. “Not only does she do things on the court, but she’s very charismatic and she’s very motivated to win and that’s contagious.” Kennedy went on to say that Council’s versatile skill set causes matchup problems for Loyola’s opponents. “She can shoot the ball and she’s strong putting the ball on the floor and getting to the free-throw line,” she said. “I’ve had a lot of other coaches talk to me about how good they think she is.”
In the conference championship game however, Council only went 1 of 8 from the field as Loyola lost to Southern Polytechnic 60-44. The ‘Pack only shot 35.6 percent from the floor as Amy Moody, who had scored 22 against Lee, lead the ‘Pack in scoring that day with only 12 points. Guard Jasmine Brewer, the only other Loyola player in double figures, scored 10 points.
The poor shooting percentage that night was not the only thing that led to the loss for the Wolfpack. Kennedy also cited the difficult matchup they were up against with Southern Polytechnic’s Marisa Stotler patrolling the paint. “She’s a Pac-10 post player who can just score,” she said about Stotler, who used to compete at the DI level in NCCA at Washington State and Boise State before attending Southern Polytechnic.
The ‘Pack were only down by three at half time but could not stop Southern on defense as they were outscored by 13 in the second half. “Going against a team like that, that can defend like they can, you have to shoot well and take care of the ball, and on those two things we didn’t have our best day.” Kennedy said. Loyola had 20 turnovers in the game, while Southern had 10.
“I was so upset for them that they didn’t win that championship,” said Kennedy. She also said she was impressed with the team’s focus and applauded their passion, saying, “I’m just so proud of how much they cared and how hard they worked.”
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