George Washington University Athletics
George Washington 63, Richmond 44
3/6/2005 12:00:00 AM | Women's Basketball
March 6, 2005
George Washington (22-7) advanced to the championship game of the 2005 Atlantic 10 Women's Basketball Championship with a 63-44 rout of W#3 Richmond (23-7) in the semifinals of the tournament on Sunday, March 6 at the Smith Center. It will be the ninth time the Colonials have advanced to the title tilt, tied with Saint Joseph's for the most of any A-10 squad. The Colonials have won the tournament four times, most recently in 2003.
GW scored the first eight points of the second half versus the Spiders to extend its 25-23 halftime margin to 33-23 with 16:38 left on the clock. A pair of Kelly Roche free throws snapped the scoring drought for Richmond, but a jumper by sophomore Kenan Cole put the Colonials back up by 10. With GW still owning a 10-point lead, it went on a 17-5 run to take its largest advantage of the game, 63-41, with 2:28 to play. Senior Liz Dancause scored all seven of her points during the stretch. Richmond tallied the last three points of the contest to produce the final score.
Senior All-America candidate Anna Montañana again paced GW with 16 points. She also grabbed seven rebounds and had four steals. Freshman Kimberly Beck notched 11 points, including 10 in the second half. She contributed a semifinal record seven steals, which also tied her with four players for the tournament standard.
The Colonials held Richmond to just 13 field goals (13-44, .295) in the game. Sixteen of the Spiders' points came from the free-throw line where they were 16- of-21 (.762). Alison Mitchell tallied a team-best 13 points, while Kelly Roche and Christina Campion each scored seven.
