It can make it tough to swallow at times, which was what Colorado State's women's basketball team was wrestling with after a 75-65 loss to top-seeded UNLV in the Mountain West Tournament championship Wednesday night at the Thomas & Mack Center.
The Rams entered the field as the No. 6 seed, and started a countdown. Three went by the wayside in the form of rival Wyoming to start. Then came two, a New Mexico team which had beaten them twice. They gave it a run at a launch into the NCAA Tournament, but the Rebels closed out strong to earn the berth.
Disappointment, certainly. Pride, most definitely.
"We're really happy with the way we performed," CSU guard McKenna Hofschild said. "I think getting here is very impressive, so, there's a lot to be proud of."
Colorado State through the first haymaker, with Upe Atosu hitting a pair of 3-pointers to open the game as the Rams built up a 9-point edge after just a few minutes of play. Led by tournament MVP Essence Booker, the Rebels fired back and at a few points in the game threatened to blow it open.
As Booker controlled the show, UNLV (26-6) built a 12-point margin in the second period, but the Rams were able to get it down to seven by halftime.
Early in the third, the lead grew to 13 points, but Colorado State closed on an 8-0 run to trim the margin to five. The Rams wore green warmup shirts which read 'No Quit' all tournament, and they never showed any.
"I feel like they got a little run in that third quarter, but we just had a lot of fight, a lot of heart to not give up, because we had nothing to lose," Karly Murphy said. "I think that was a big key for us, just going out there and giving all we have and see what we can do."
Just like the start of the game, the fourth quarter was pure energy from the first inbound play. Sydney Mech hit a 3-pointer from the side to make it a 60-58 UNLV lead with 5:04 to play, and with 4:24 on the clock, Hofschild completed a three-point play to make it a one-point game.
That's where UNLV separated for a last time. A couple of key offensive rebounds led to points. The Rams missed some good looks, and Desi-Rae Young hit a tough, fade away jumper on the baseline. Winning plays, and Booker put the final touches on her MVP award with eight points in the final stanza, giving her 25 for the game to go along with five assists and five rebounds.
Hofschild led all scorers with 27, not giving up an inch. She pulled down six rebounds and handed out six assists, but she never felt like she was trying to match her counterpart, she was simply giving her team the best shot to win.
"Not necessarily. I think I just wanted to help this team win in any way possible," said Hofschild, whose 208 assists on the year stand as a single-season record. "(Booker) had a great game, and I think when there's offense clicking from them, you have to find offense clicking for us. I was just trying to do that for this team."
The Rams just didn't muster enough down the stretch to put a final stamp on an amazing run at the end of the year. This was a team which had lost its final three games of the regular season, yet Williams saw something in his squad which gave him hope.
"Just the way we kind of played down the stretch. The Wyoming game ... If we make another basket, that's a whole different story," he said. "We walked off the court, you could not tell me our kids were not in this. You just could not convince me of that, that they wanted to keep improving and winning was important to them. And we practiced well. We kept practicing well. All 12 kids came to work every day and had fun in the gym. These are long seasons, and it's kind of a grind and it's easy to kind of fade down the stretch, especially if you have some tough losses late. They kept playing for each other, there was joy on the court."
Just not in the end result. The effort was another story.
Karly Murphy was blanked in the first half, but the second night in a row, found a groove in the third, scoring 10 points. She also had a second straight double-double with 12 points and 10 rebounds, a total that gives her a share of the single-season mark with 278. Upe Atosu, here for one season, scored 10 points and joined Hofschild on the all-tournament team.
Playing well, on this night, just wasn't enough. Williams hopes the final run will draw the attention of the WNIT enough to extend an invitation. Murphy and Hofschild said they're both having too much fun to see this come to an end.
There was sadness in the locker room, but no shame to be found.
"That's athletics. That's sports," Williams said. "I think we walk away from tonight, we went for it; those kids went for this thing every single night. They can hold their heads high. We didn't play bad, we just got beat. Welcome to basketball.
"You have to make some shots. We didn't, they did. The shots we got, those are good shots. Those are shots that can win you games, we just didn't make them at a high enough clip tonight and Vegas did. That's why I give congrats to UNLV, but our team played a good basketball game."
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