It’s finally over.
Georgetown’s extended downward spiral ended Wednesday night, as the Hoyas fell to Baylor 74-72 in the first round of the NIT. The game was a microcosm of the Hoyas’ season, with a tantalizing first half performance giving way to a late collapse.
In the early going, the Hoyas played like the squad that had all but disappeared since mid-January. Georgetown had one of its best shooting performances of the season in the first half, connecting from everywhere on the court.
“I think we were definitely being patient,” Greg Monroe said of the offensive barrage. “We were just waiting for the best shot.”
Starting at the 16-minute mark, the Hoyas broke off an 18-5 run to take control of the game. Georgetown headed into halftime up 10 after shooting 76 percent from the field, including 6-of-10 from beyond the arc.
Senior Jessie Sapp contributed two treys during the run. Sapp did his best to extend his Georgetown career, scoring nine points on 50 percent shooting in his final game as a Hoya.
But Sapp wasn’t the only one playing with a sense of urgency. The Bears, who feature five seniors, came out refocused and ready to challenge the Hoyas in the second half.
Baylor charged out of the locker room, going on a 13-2 run to open the half. Sophomore LaceDarius Dunn scored the last 11 of those points.
“I think that the first five minutes of the second half were the most important minutes of the entire game,” Dunn said. “I just give credit to the guards for finding me when I was open.”
Georgetown’s scorching-hot first half was too good to be true, and down the stretch they began to resemble the team that limped through the season’s second half.
As the Bears heated up, the Hoyas’ hands went cold, and they could not make the necessary adjustments. Georgetown tried in vain to continue its outside attack, making 3 of 14 from three-point range in the second half.
“I think once [Monroe] got the ball, they put four bodies and six or eight arms around him, which made it more difficult for him to score,” coach John Thompson III said. “We were throwing it back out and those are threes you have to take because you are wide open. The ball just didn’t go in the basket.”
It wasn’t just Georgetown’s shooting that lost them the game though. DaJuan Summers, despite a team-leading 19 points, air-balled two ill-advised threes in quick succession as Baylor mounted its comeback. Monroe lost the ball on three consecutive possessions in the crucial closing minutes. And the Hoya defense continually lapsed, allowing Bears’ senior guard Kevin Rogers to have his way inside, including at least three alley-oops.
Despite these miscues, the Hoyas still had a chance at the end. A missed Baylor free throw gave DaJuan Summers the ball with three seconds left, down by two. He let it go from half court, but it simply brushed the net, passing harmlessly under the rim.
Fittingly, in its final game, this Georgetown team came up short.
Did the Voice go to Baylor or just grab quotes from GUHoyas.com without attribution?
Greg Monroe:
Thanks for your comment. We actually received the quotes from Sports Information, the office that handles all interactions between players/coaches and the press. Sports Information emails us a list of quotes after every game that are approved for use in covering the game.
Sports Information is likely to use those same quotes on guhoyas.com, but no – we never take quotes from any source without attribution.
Thank you for your concern for the maintenance of our journalistic integrity.
But you don’t attribute them to the Sports Information e-mails in your story. If you didn’t have a reporter at the game, you don’t actually know what the guys said. Your quotes should read more like this:
“I think we were definitely being patient,” Greg Monroe said of the offensive barrage, according to an e-mail from sports information. “We were just waiting for the best shot.”
We are not required to attribute quotes to Sports Information. That’s how our relationship with them (and the relationship they have with the press in general) works. We can choose to attribute quotes to them if we wish, but we are not required to do so.
Sorry, Chelsea. You missed my point. I don’t think you broke any rules. All I saying is that you have no idea what Greg said. You just know what Sports Information told you he said. Don’t your readers have a right to know that?
Ok, in that sense, I suppose we could have attributed it to Sports Information, but if Sports Information misrepresented what Greg said, then we have a major problem with the integrity of the administration.
Also, I highly doubt Sports Information has any motivation for misquoting the players.
Sorry, Chelsea, for letting this drag on. Two last comments and then I’ll let it go, because I’m sure you have more important things to do than respond to me.
(1) Sports Information has a clear interest in making players sound more articulate and well-spoken than they actually are — after all, Georgetown looks better when this is the case, and the sports information staff looks like they are doing a better job. A player probably wouldn’t say the sky is blue and then sports information reports he said it was red, but sports info may clean up the grammar.
(2) It just seems to me, as someone who likes all the campus journalism options, that it doesn’t matter whether your source of information has a motivation to deceive you. Regardless, if journalists don’t get something first hand, they should let their readers know.