Albany Center Shereesha Richards jumps with Maine forward Bella Swan during their America East Conference title game on Friday, March 11th. Friday afternoon, the Albany Great Danes would face Florida in the NCAA tournament. Photo by Chris Lessner.
SYRACUSE, NY- America East teams were 4-26 in the NCAA tournament prior to Friday afternoon. You can now make that 5-26 as five-time America East Champion and 12th seed Albany would rally late without one of their star players to upset fifth seed Florida 61-59 at the Carrier Dome in an NCAA first round game.
3-time conference player of the year Shereesha Richards battled foul trouble all day long and fouled out with still seven minutes remaining in the game. Richards had 14 points in her 22 minutes of action. The Great Danes fell behind by as many as 17 points as the Gators took advantage of the non presence of Richards.
Junior guard Imani Tate would step up big time though for Albany scoring 28 points, hauling down eight rebounds and dishing out four assists to help rally her team from behind. Florida led 57-48 when Richards picked up her fifth and final foul but Albany finished the game on a 15-2 run including a put back by Tianna-Jo Carter with eight seconds left to help seal it. Albany held the Gators scoreless for almost eight minutes in the fourth quarter until a late score with four tenths of a second remaining.
Eleanna Christinaki scored 11 points for Florida while Ronnie Williams had 10 points and seven rebounds. The Gators finish their season at 22-9.
Albany shot the ball well from the floor at 50% while Florida shot only 35%. Florida outrebounded Albany 38-28 but turned the ball over 25 times compared to 20 for Albany.
Albany (28-4) will now face Syracuse (26-7) in a second round game on Sunday afternoon.
