EVANSVILLE, Ind. – A short-handed University of Tennessee at Martin women’s basketball squad competed for the Ohio Valley Conference Basketball Championship crown on Saturday afternoon, but ultimately dropped an 81-53 decision to top-seeded Southern Indiana. Despite the loss, the Skyhawks officially secured the OVC’s automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament as the tournament runner-up.
UT Martin (16-16) earned its fifth NCAA Tournament berth after knocking off Little Rock in the tournament semifinals on Friday afternoon. Regardless of today’s championship game result, Southern Indiana would be ineligible for NCAA operated events due to its reclassification status, so the Skyhawks claimed the league’s automatic bid and celebrated accordingly in the locker room following the game.
With the team’s postseason fate already decided, the Skyhawks decided to proceed on the side of caution and rest its battled tested players while giving their young pieces valuable tournament experience as four of the team’s five projected starters missed the contest.
While facing an uphill battle, the team’s young performers stepped up for the Skyhawks. Local Union City product Amari Bonds made the most of her opportunity by coming off the bench and scoring a career-high 26 points. Bonds made 10-of-18 field goal attempts in 31 minutes while knocking down four three-pointers.
In total, all six UT Martin players reached the scoring column as Bonds came off the bench while Mah Minthe (12 points, five rebounds), Tori Rubel (three points, eight rebounds), Sophie Singleton (four points, three rebounds), Love Mays (four points, six rebounds, five assists) and Kendal George (four points) earned starts for the Skyhawks.
“I thought it was a heck of a performance by our bunch with 30 minutes to prepare, to try and execute a gameplan, when they haven’t gotten much gametime all year long,” UT Martin head coach Kevin McMillan said. “When you ask kids to play the minutes we ask them, the odds of getting one of them injured was too much. There was no chance that I would risk them not having the chance to play in the NCAA tournament. Kids dream of this. With as beat up and injured as we were, I’m never going to put the welfare and health of my kids behind anything else. It wasn’t an easy decision, it was gut-wrenching, but there was no way I was going to gamble with that.”
Southern Indiana (24-6) capped off an impressive run in its second season as a Division I member by sweeping the league’s championships with regular season and tournament crowns. With the OVC Basketball Championship being played in their hometown, the Screaming Eagles put on a show for their home faithful by shooting 47 percent from the field and leading by as much as 31 points.
USI put four players in double figures, led by 15 points and nine rebounds from Vanessa Shafford, in the title game. Meredith Raley was named OVC Tournament MVP after scoring 13 points and adding six rebounds while Triniti Ralston and Chloe Gannon chipped in 14 points each.
UT Martin will find out its postseason fate on Sunday, March 17 at 7 p.m. on ESPN during the NCAA Selection Show.
