It’s Payback Time For Cardinal Stanford Avenges 1996 Loss To Georgia 82-47, Heads To Final Four Showdown With Old Dominion

Now Georgia knows how it feels.

Olympia Scott had 21 points and nine rebounds Monday night, leading Stanford to an 82-47 blowout of the Bulldogs in the women’s West Regional title game.

With the win, Stanford (34-1) reversed its loss to Georgia in last year’s national semifinal game and earned the right to pay back its only loss of this season in a matchup against Old Dominion in the Final Four on Friday in Cincinnati.

“Going into the game, I think definitely revenge was on our minds in some ways,” tournament MVP Jamila Wideman said. “We wanted to go to Cincinnati so bad, and basically they were the team that was standing between us and that goal.”

Georgia (25-6) hit its first four 3-pointers, including back-to-back 3s by Kedra Holland-Corn and Brandi Decker to take a 16-7 lead.

La’Keshia Frett’s baseline jumper with 12:33 to play put the Bulldogs up 18-11. But it was all Stanford from then on as it outscored Georgia 27-4 the rest of the half.

“I thought the game started well, but as we went up, it seemed they defensively became more aggressive and then started to adjust, switch on screens and that created some problems for us,” coach Andy Landers said.

Stanford closed the half with a 27-4 run, including driving layups by Wideman and Kate Starbird and a three-point play by Scott that gave the Cardinal a 38-22 lead at halftime.

“They got out on us on some outside shots,” Stanford coach Tara VanDerveer said. “We were really focused on not letting them get their inside game going. When they hit some early jump shots, I didn’t like that. But they took the same shots later and they weren’t falling for them.”

Tracy Henderson scored the first four points of the second half to pull Georgia to 38-26, but the Bulldogs could get no closer.

Kristin Folkl completed a three-point play, Vanessa Nygaard hit a 3-pointer and Scott had a three-point play on a nice touch pass from Starbird during a run that put the Cardinal ahead 53-32 with 13:14 to go.

Starbird, the Naismith Player of the Year, finished with 15 points, while Folkl added 14.

Holland-Corn led Georgia with 13 points, but missed 10 of 14 shots.

MEMO: This sidebar appeared with the story: FINAL FOUR At Cincinnati Notre Dame Tennessee Stanford Old Dominion