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South Carolina (34-2), the top overall seed in the tournament,
will face UConn (29-5), winner of 11 national titles, in the
title game Sunday night at Target Center.
Boston, the Naismith National Player of the Year and Defensive
Player of the Year, hit 8 of 12 shots and 6 of 7 free throws.
The 6-5 junior punctuated her performance with her only
3-pointer, which made it 68-54 with 3:12 left.
"She's 6-foot-5. That impacts it. She has good hands. She moves
well. She finishes on both sides of the floor. She goes after
the ball. She's good. She's really good. It doesn't take me to
tell you what she's good at," Louisville coach Jeff Walz said of
Boston.
Brea Beal added 12 points and Destanni Henderson 11 for the
Gamecocks, who lost to Stanford, 66-65, in the national
semifinals last season. South Carolina won its only national
title in 2017.
Emily Engstler had 18 points and nine rebounds for Louisville
(29-5) before fouling out with 4:56 remaining. Hailey Van Lith,
who scored at least 20 points in each of the first four
tournament games, was held to nine points on 4-of-11 shooting.
South Carolina gained control with runs on each side of the
half. The Gamecocks closed the second quarter with a 10-4 run
for a 34-28 lead, then opened the third period with a 10-2
spurt. Victaria Saxton hit two free throws to put South Carolina
up 44-30.
After going 2 of 9 from beyond the arc in the first two
quarters, the Gamecocks hit their first three attempts from deep
in the third quarter, pushing the lead to 51-36 on Henderson's
3-pointer.
"We have to play through her," South Carolina coach Dawn Staley
said of Boston. "It doesn't mean that she has to shoot the ball,
but every time she touches the ball, she draws a crowd. If we're
able to kick it out -- that's probably a time that we need to
take those shots, but I thought we just got in the rhythm of
shooting outside shots that really didn't make any sense, and it
just threw off our transitional defensive balance. But we
corrected it, and when we started going into her, playing inside
out, more shots from the outside started falling."
The Cardinals scored six straight to pull within 54-48, but
Boston converted a three-point play with 4.2 seconds left as
Engstler picked up her fourth foul.
Boston said that play "was really big just because it gave us
momentum, and it also got somebody else in foul trouble, which
we could always benefit from."
Walz said he expected his team would face difficulties if the
Gamecocks began to hit their shots.
"You've got to give South Carolina credit; we came out of the
third quarter and trapped, out of the initial pass, had them
scrambling, and I think they go three for three, their first
three threes to start the first quarter," he said.
"I said, ‘If they make 10 threes we're going to be in trouble.'
They made three out of five in the third quarter, and we're
still right there with a chance."
South Carolina threatened to pull away early in the second
quarter, but Louisville erased a 19-10 deficit with a 12-0 run.
After being outrebounded 9-1 in opening minutes, Louisville
battled back to even the rebound count at 19-19 at the half and
held a 10-2 advantage in second-chance points.
--Jim Hoehn, Field Level Media
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