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Brittany Griner

March 24, 2012 by · Comments Off on Brittany Griner 

Brittany Griner, Baylor women’s basketball star Brittney Griner put the exclamation point on a trip to the NCAA Tournament’s Elite Eight with a two-handed dunk Saturday in the second half an 83-68 victory against Georgia Tech. The dunk by Baylor’s Brittney Griner punctuated a 35-point day.

Griner, a 6-8 junior, sprinted behind the defense to deliver a dunk that brought the crowd at Wells Fargo Arena to its feet. Baylor, with the game well in hand, had substitutes at the scorer’s table when Griner swung from the rim after the dunk – which ended her game with 35 points, 10 rebounds and six blocks.

The dunk, with 6 minutes, 27 seconds left, was the seventh of Griner’s career – and second in the tournament. Griner became the second woman to dunk in the NCAA Tournament – following Tennessee’s Candace Parker against Army in 2006 – in a win vs. Florida.

The dunk ties Griner and Parker for the most in a career for a woman, with seven.

Destiny Williams added 18 points on 9-for-10 shooting for the top-seeded Lady Bears (37-0), who’ll play second-seeded Tennessee in the regional final on Monday night, the winner advancing to the Final Four.

Baylor, the 2005 national champion, will be seeking its third Final Four appearance and second in three years. Tennessee, which has won eight titles, will try to get to the national semifinals for the 19th time.

The Lady Bears took control with a 20-0 first-half run and never gave fourth-seeded Tech (26-9) a chance to answer back. Sharpshooting freshman Sydney Wallace led Georgia Tech with 32 points.

Brittney Griner Dunk

March 21, 2012 by · Comments Off on Brittney Griner Dunk 

Brittney Griner Dunk, At this point, Brittney Griner takes her dunks in stride – but her coach would like to see a few more of them. That was the message from Baylor’s Kim Mulkey after her star center’s right-handed slam highlighted another convincing win for the top-seeded Lady Bears.

“I think she’s gotten away from trying to be monstrous with her going to the rim,” Mulkey said. “I told her about two weeks ago – I said: ‘Even if you miss it, it sends a message.'”

Griner became the second woman to dunk in an NCAA tournament game Tuesday night, and Baylor beat ninth-seeded Florida 76-57. After a fairly quiet game-and-a-half to start the tournament, Griner took a pass from a teammate, stepped toward the hoop, stretched out her right arm and jammed the ball through.

It was the first dunk in over a year for the 6-foot-8 phenom.

“I think my team got fired up a little bit more than me. I got a little bit more fired up, I think, on one of the blocks I had,” Griner said. “But it definitely felt good throwing it down.”

Odyssey Sims added 14 points for Baylor (36-0). Azania Stewart led Florida (20-13) with 14.

Candace Parker of Tennessee dunked twice in an NCAA tournament game in 2006 against Army. Griner’s dunk was her first of the season and sixth of her career. Parker holds the career record with seven.

Griner played about half the game in Baylor’s rout of UC Santa Barbara in the first round, and she didn’t attempt a shot for almost 10 minutes against the Gators. But she began to assert herself late in the first half, in a sign of things to come.

She began the second half with a turnaround and a layup. Then Kimetria Hayden came up with an offensive rebound near the basket and passed to an open Griner, who dunked for the first time since Feb. 19, 2011, at Texas Tech.

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