DePaul’s return to the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 2019 didn’t go as planned.
The Blue Demons trailed by 23 points at halftime and fell 88-57 to Dayton in a First Four game Wednesday night in Ames, Iowa. The Flyers shot 56.5% from beyond the 3-point arc, hitting 13 of 23.
Freshman Aneesah Morrow led DePaul (22-11) with 28 points, 17 rebounds and three blocks but didn’t get much help. Seniors Sonya Morris and Lexi Held combined for 16 points on 5-of-20 shooting. DePaul entered the night leading the nation in scoring with 88.3 points per game but couldn’t find its groove from the onset.
“We took a lot of terrible 2s (in the first half),” DePaul coach Doug Bruno said. “That second quarter when we were down 15, 16 points, it was just continuous bad shot after bad shot. (Dayton’s) length bothered us, but another pass, another pass and another pass, you can find an open shot.”
Dayton (26-5) caught fire from the perimeter in the first half, starting out 10 of 12 on the way to a 16-point lead halfway through the second quarter. Heading into the night, the Flyers had attempted only 5.9 3-pointers per game and converted 33.8%.
“I tell them all the time, ‘Keep shooting, keep shooting,'” Dayton coach Shauna Green said. “We executed our offense in the half court and our transition break in holding them to one-and-dones. The difference is the ball goes in today. Sometimes that ball doesn’t go in, but when it does, we look like this and we are pretty darn good.”
The Flyers advance as the No. 11 seed in the Greensboro Region to face sixth-seeded Georgia on Friday.
Dayton’s 3-point barrage combined with DePaul’s foul trouble and struggles to find open looks ultimately did in the Blue Demons, who didn’t qualify for the tournament last year and were 28-5 when the 2020 tournament was canceled because of the pandemic.
Earlier in the day, the Associated Press selected Morrow as a second-team All-American after the Simeon graduate’s historic first season with the Blue Demons. She was the only freshman to appear on the AP’s three All-America teams.
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Northwestern senior guard Veronica Burton was picked for the third team.
Entering Wednesday’s game, Morrow was averaging 21.7 points, a national-best 13.8 rebounds and 2.7 steals.
“I knew (my first season) was going to be challenging,” Morrow said during a news conference Tuesday. “It’s about getting better every day, and my coaches and teammates helped me with that every single day, challenging me on and off the court and even in the film room.”
Morrow’s meteoric rise into the national spotlight started on opening night. With the program’s third all-time leading scorer, Allie Quigley, in attendance, Morrow put up 31 points in 23 minutes against Texas Southern. It was the highest-scoring debut by a DePaul player in 36 years.
“Her motor and relentlessness is what sticks out to me,” Quigley told the Tribune in February. “She is young and raw, but if she continues to work on her skills, there’s no reason she can’t keep doing this every single year.”
Morrow went on a tear in the last two-thirds of the season to become the consensus pick as the national freshman of the year. She recorded 23 straight double-doubles — and leads the nation with 27 overall after Wednesday’s game — and broke 11 Big East records. She also cracked the top 10 in voting for Naismith Defensive Player of the Year.
“She’s going to be a (multi-time) All-American,” Bruno said Tuesday. “We are thrilled to have Aneesah in our program.”
Burton averaged 17 points, 6.4 assists and 5.5 rebounds in her final season with the Wildcats. She led the nation in steals (4.03 per game) for the second year in a row and won her third consecutive Big Ten Defensive Player of the Year award.
Northwestern wasn’t among the 68 teams selected for the NCAA Tournament and it declined an invitation to the WNIT. Burton’s last game came against Iowa in the Big Ten Tournament, and she scored 25 points in a 72-59 loss.
“Hard to put into words the opportunities that this place has given us, honestly,” Burton said after the loss. “Super thankful for all the things on the court, but more importantly all the things off the court, the relationships, the memories and the opportunities.”
James Kay is a freelance reporter for the baiduhai.