Women’s Basketball Upsets No. 24 Penn State, 70-65 – Ohio State Buckeyes
12/30/2001 12:00:00 AM | Women's Basketball
Dec 30, 2001
Box Score| Quotes| Notes
State College, Pa. – The Ohio State women’s basketball team notched its biggest win of the young season Sunday, earning a 70-65 win over No. 24 Penn State in front of 6,990 spectators at the Bryce Jordan Center.
D’wan Shackleford (Jr., Newark, Ohio/Newark) led the Buckeye charge with a career-best 21 points on 9-of-10 shooting. Charisse Crews (Fr., Urbancrest, Ohio/Grove City) was big off the bench, grabbing a career-best nine rebounds, as the Buckeyes dominated the boards, 45-28.
Ohio State (6-7, 1-1 Big Ten) got off to a solid start, matching the Lady Lions shot for shot throughout the first half. Penn State (8-5, 1-1) jumped out to an 18-12 lead on two free throws by Kelly Mazzante at the 11:03 mark, but the Buckeyes held PSU to just one free throw over the next 4:34 and took the lead, 20-19, on a Tomeka Brown (Sr., Columbus, Ohio/Marion Franklin) three-pointer with 7:05 left. Shackleford followed with a deuce to push the lead to three.
After a Mazzante trey, the teams battled to a stalemate until the end of the half, when DiDi Reynolds (Jr., Portage, Ohio/Hopewell-Loudon) drilled a three-pointer with 40 seconds left to give Ohio State a 31-28 lead at halftime.
Ohio State grabbed its largest lead of the contest, 57-51, with 6:47 left on a 7-0 run capped by a Courtney Coleman (Jr., Cincinnati, Ohio/Hughes) bucket. The Lady Lions roared back and took the lead back, 61-60, on a Mazzante triple with 3:55 remaining. Coleman tied the game with a free throw before Shackleford gave the Buckeyes the lead for good with two charity tosses. After Mazzante missed the front end of a one-and-one opportunity, Brown connected on two more free throws to give OSU a 65-61 advantage with 1:16 left.
Penn State’s Jessica Brungo cut the lead in half with two free throws 11 seconds later, but the Buckeyes came right back as Brown drilled an 18-footer with 23 seconds remaining to push the lead back to four, 67-63. Brungo came back with a bucket with 14 seconds left, but Lauren Shenk (Sr., Minster, Ohio/Minster) put the game away with two free throws and Brown added one more charity toss to give the Buckeyes the five-point (70-65) win.
The Buckeyes placed four starters in double figures, led by Shackleford’s 21. Coleman added 14, Brown scored 12 and Shenk chipped in 10.
Mazzante, coming off a Big Ten record-tying 49-point performance at Minnesota, scored 29 points to lead Penn State
The Buckeyes return to Big Ten action Thursday night, hosting Iowa at 7 p.m. in Value City Arena.
