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Veteran comes through Senior Irwin-Osbolt leads Georgia to victory over SMU
Posted: Tuesday March 16, 1999 08:41 PM
ATHENS, Ga. (AP) -- The first game of Pam Irwin-Osbolt's career was against Southern Methodist four seasons ago. She was determined that the same opponent would not be her last. Playing her final game on her home floor, the senior guard came off the bench with disciplined shooting and some timely rebounding, to spark third-seeded Georgia to a 68-55 win over SMU in the second round of the Mideast Regionals Monday night. Irwin-Osbolt finished with 13 points on five-of-seven shooting. She was the only Lady Bulldog who shot better than 50 percent from the field. Georgia shot 37 percent as a team. "Offensively, that was some of the ugliest basketball in the history of Naismith's sweet game," said Georgia coach Andy Landers. "We shot the ball when we shouldn't have, and we threw it inside where you might have expected us to shoot it, and instead we threw it back outside and started all over." Georgia (25-6) placed three more players in double figures. Twins Kelly and Coco Miller scored 14 apiece, and Tawana McDonald contributed 11 points and a career-high 13 rebounds. Eleventh-seeded SMU (20-11), seeking its first trip to the final 16, got 22 points from Karlin Kennedy and 16 from Claudia Brassard. Georgia will make its 11th trip to the Sweet 16 this weekend in Cincinnati against second-seeded Clemson. SMU bolted to a 10-2 lead in the first four minutes on the strength of its perimeter shooting. Kennedy scored the first two baskets of the game en route to 12 first-half points. Georgia, meanwhile, misfired over the SMU zone throughout the first half, hitting just two of 10 3-point attempts. "How smart do you have to be to recognize a good shot?" complained Landers. "Do you have to be able to split the atom? Do you have to get hit in the head with a meteor to catch the ball four feet from the basket and turn and look and see if you might have a shot?" Coco Miller hit a 3-pointer as the shot-clock buzzed, igniting a 12-3 run that put the Lady Dogs on top 20-18 with 7:18 to play in the first half. It was Georgia's only lead of the half, which ended in a 25-25 tie. To combat Georgia's 26 percent shooting from the first half, Landers started Irwin-Osbolt in the second half, and she responded with five points in the first minute. After an 8-0 run gave Georgia a 40-36 lead, layups by Nici Johnson and Claudia Brassard tied the game at 40-40 with 11:40 to play. Irwin-Osbolt hit another trey, and Georgia found a few creases in the SMU zone, creeping to a 52-44 lead with six-minutes to play on a breakaway layup by Deana Nolan. "The story of this game was that we went cold for about 10 minutes," said SMU coach Rhonda Rompola. "There was a lid on the basket. Against a team like Georgia, you have got to bring your best game." SMU closed the gap to 54-49 on a 3-pointer by Jennifer Rigg with 3:33 to play. But Irwin-Osbolt scored on a short jumper to start an 8-0 run that put the game out of reach. The only other game between these two teams was the season opener in November 1995, when Georgia won 95-65. Just plain Pam Irwin then, she scored five points while shooting two-for-eight.
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