At the five-minute mark of the second half, Carmen Tyson-Thomas passed directly to Louisville’s Jude Schimmel. The guard broke away and laid it in uncontested to give the Cardinals a one-point advantage.

Fourteen seconds later, Syracuse’s Cornelia Fondren dribbled past a slew of Louisville defenders and inside for a routine layup of her own, bringing the lead back to the Orange. Syracuse didn’t trail again.

Fondren’s layup sparked a 16-0 Orange run midway through the second half. SU held No. 13 Louisville scoreless for eight minutes, turning the one-point SU deficit into a 15-point edge that was not relinquished. The burst propelled No. 24 Syracuse (23-6, 11-5 Big East) to a 68-57 win over the Cardinals (23-7, 11-5) in front of 441 in the Carrier Dome on Monday night in both teams’ regular-season finale. The win snapped a three-game losing streak during which the Orange squandered three consecutive halftime leads, and likely solidified Syracuse’s place in the NCAA Tournament for the first time in five seasons.

“We definitely needed this,” senior center Kayla Alexander said. “ … It wasn’t exactly the prettiest win, but we got it together and we took care of business.”

After Fondren’s bucket gave SU the lead, the Orange maintained momentum through the eight-minute spurt with a nearly flawless combination of aggressive defense and offensive execution. Syracuse started to fluster Louisville by using a full-court press and double-teaming the ball handler on most possessions, forcing the Cardinals into poor shot selection and a string of misses.

Tyson-Thomas grabbed a rebound off of an Antonita Slaughter miss and raced down the court. The guard fed the ball to Fondren, who quickly swung the ball back to the senior.

Tyson-Thomas didn’t hesitate, knocking down a 3 to give SU what was then its largest lead of the game at 44-38.

“I think when we did start getting those loose-ball rebounds, we did start pushing the ball in transition,” Tyson-Thomas said. “We did start making plays. We didn’t make many shots that we took, but we did get after it when we missed.”

With the crowd rising to its feet in anticipation of the brewing upset, the Orange defense continued to hold the Cardinals scoreless, maintaining the press and boxing out to keep Louisville’s second chances to a minimum.

Rachel Coffey relieved Fondren at the point around the 11-minute mark. On her first possession of the half, Coffey took a feed from Tyson-Thomas and drained a 3 to push the Orange’s lead to nine.

The three rotation seniors – Tyson-Thomas, Alexander and guard Elashier Hall – all scored in different fashions to complete the run and ensure it would take a near miracle for the Orange to lose. A swish by Tyson-Thomas on a shot from just right of the foul line, an Alexander free throw as a byproduct of a hard drive and a 3-point shot gave SU a 53-38 lead with 8:44 to play.

Schimmel air-balled a 3 on the next possession, and it took nearly two more minutes until Bria Smith finally ended Louisville’s drought with a layup at the 6:40 mark.

“I think we got together and stopped them defensively,” Hall said. “There were a lot of times where they were making shot-clock violations, and that really picked up our momentum and really got us going.”

Syracuse needed almost the entire cushion it built during the run, with the Cardinals fighting back and closing the gap to 60-56 on Schimmel’s 3 with 1:15 to play. But the Orange finished the game 6-for-6 from the foul line.

The win meant the difference between the No. 3 and No. 5 seed in the Big East tournament for Syracuse, which earns a double bye and six days of rest before a Big East quarterfinal matchup in Hartford, Conn., on Sunday.

“We started making plays as a team, instead of as individuals,” Tyson-Thomas said. “And I think that was the key instrument for our successful play.”

Published on March 5, 2013 at 2:23 am

Contact Kevin: kmprisei@syr.edu