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Finding her touch Eblin scores 14 points as ODU defeats Tennessee Tech
Posted: Friday March 12, 1999 10:31 PM
NORFOLK, Va. (AP) -- From the time she launched her very first 3-pointer on Friday night, Aubrey Eblin knew her stroke had returned. And when that first one dropped with about six minutes to go in the first half, and then another followed a minute or so later, she had proof. ''I knew they were going to go down tonight," Old Dominion's senior sniper said after making four 3-pointers as Old Dominion opened the NCAA tournament at home with a 74-48 victory over Tennessee Tech. The Lady Monarchs (27-3), who struggled in winning their eighth straight Colonial Athletic Association championship last weekend, scored 13 straight points early in the second half to turn a close game into a runaway. And Eblin was a big part of it. One week after she totaled one point in the last two games of the fifth-ranked Lady Monarchs' Colonial Athletic Association tournament victory, she scored the last eight in the run. "'Last week I did a lot of extra shooting," she said. "The coaches got me in the gym and I took a lot of shots and that really helped a lot." Lucienne Berthieu led Old Dominion with 18 points, and the Lady Monarchs forced a season-high 32 turnovers by a Tennessee Tech team that coach Bill Worrell said was 'fretting mentally' in the face of swarming defense that erased an early 8-2 lead for the Golden Eaglettes and never relented.
"I was having fun there for a while," Worrell said, 'and then it got like a job that you don't want to go to." Trailing 39-31 with 16:42 to play, Tennessee Tech went six minutes without a point. The drought included nine of a 32 season-high turnovers, eight during a four-minute stretch when Tech didn't even get off a shot. "'We just kind of wished passes, and they aren't going to get there at this level," said Diane Seng, who had six points, nine below her average. Old Dominion, meanwhile, was working on its inside and out combinations. Eblin hit two 3s in the first half, the first causing her to pump her fist with an about-time look on her face, and she made her first try from the left wing in the second half with 13:49 to play. That made it 47-31. On the ensuing possession, Eblin stole the ball at midcourt and drove in for a finger roll. Less than a minute later, she capped her own 8-point run with another 3-pointer, this from the top of the key, to make it 52-31. Janet Holt led Tennessee Tech with eight points on 4-for-12 shooting, and Andrea Baldwin and Colin Carmichael had even each. The Golden Eaglettes finished 18-for-50 from the field, and were outrebounded 39-28. Old Dominion had 25 steals, six by Natalie Diaz.
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