The Daily Campus

Issue date: 12/14/08 Section: Sports

Media Credit: Associated Press Tina Charles shoots past Penn State's Julia Trogele during the second half of a Maggie Dixon Classic NCAA college basketball game at Madison Square Garden in New York on Sunday.

NEW YORK - Junior Center Tina Charles made the most of her New York homecoming Sunday, Dec. 14, as she turned in her most dominating performance of the season to carry No. 1 UConn past Penn State, 77-63, in the second game of the Maggie Dixon Classic at Madison Square Garden.

Coach Geno Auriemma knew ahead of time that he wanted to exploit Charles' size advantage against the Lady Lions, and she responded with 29 points, 18 rebounds and four blocks in 38 minutes of play.

"Defensively, she didn't let anything into the lane," said point guard Renee Montgomery. "Defensively, she didn't really let anything into the lane. If we got beat off the dribble, she was there. On offense, she was posting up. It was just an all-around good game."

Despite Charles' powerful performance, the game was UConn's lowest scoring output of the year and worst shooting performance as the team shot just 37.7 percent from the field and 23.3 percent from 3-point range.

"We were under the impression that everyone else in the country misses shots except us and that we make them all," Auriemma said. "When we started the game and we didn't make a couple of the ones we normally do. There was a little bit of like a hurry to make shots."

Forward Maya Moore (21 points) and Montgomery (13 points) were the only other players to score in double digits for UConn (7-0). No other player had more than six points for the Huskies.

"We weren't as smooth as we'd like it to be, but I wouldn't say it was just in the first 10 minutes," Montgomery said. "I would just say the whole game we weren't as fluent as we'd like to be."

UConn finished the first half with a 34-21 lead, the biggest lead for either team to that point, but getting there wasn't pretty. The Huskies trailed for much of the game's first five minutes as Penn State (5-5) started off very aggressively.

"It's important that we realize there are a lot of good teams out there, and just because someone's record is 5-4 … does not mean they are not capable of playing good basketball," Auriemma said. "I thought Penn State played really well today. I thought they were by far one of the hardest teams we've had to defend."

It wasn't until 5:18 into the half, when Charles got a layup off a Montgomery assist, that UConn took its first lead of the half at 13-11. Even then, the Huskies had trouble pulling away from the Lady Lions over the next five minutes, trailing 19-18 as late as 11:36 into the half.

Much of that struggle in the first half came from the atypically poor shooting performance from UConn. The Huskies shot just 38.9 percent from the field and a paltry 17.6 percent from 3-point range. The Huskies had as many misses from 3-point range (14) in the first half as they had field goals altogether.

"I actually think we got just as many open looks as we did every other game," Montgomery said. "It's just the fact that we didn't make a lot of them. A lot of times our offense, we're scoring and getting back, and it gets things going, but I think the fact that we weren't making them kind of made the game seem slower."

With the rest of her teammates struggling to make their shots, Charles took over the first half, notching a double-double with 2:10 remaining and finishing the half with 14 points and 12 rebounds (with six coming on the offensive glass). Her dominance helped spark the Huskies to a 16-2 run over the final eight-and-a-half minutes of the half.

The Lady Lions, who had cut the UConn lead to single digits a few times late in the second half, threatened to do so again with 2:41 left and the score at 71-61 when guard Brianne O'Rourke attempted a layup. This time Charles blocked O'Rourke's shot, which set up a fast-break Maya Moore layup for the Huskies.

Auriemma said that Charles' late-game defense was the deciding factor in the game and his counterpart on the Penn State bench agreed.

"I think, quite honestly, Tina Charles made a couple of big plays every time we cut it to eight," said Penn State coach Coquese Washington. "I think she got two blocks in the second half. Each time we cut it to eight, not only did she get the block, she got the block, she also recovered it and they went down and scored in transition."


Michael.Northup@UConn.edu

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