Caitlin Clark, Iowa end South Carolina's perfect season in Final Four

DALLAS (AP) —Caitlin Clark overwhelmed the reigning champions with anothersensational game, scoring 41 points to help Iowa spoil SouthCarolina’s perfect season with a 77-73 victory on Friday night inthe Final Four.

Thespectacular junior guard set a record for the highest-scoringsemifinal game and became the first women’s player to postback-to-back 40-point games in the NCAA Tournament. She now has theHawkeyes in a spot they’ve never been in before — one victory awayfrom a national championship.

They’ll haveto beat another SEC team to do that as Iowa (31-6) will face LSU inthe title game on Sunday afternoon. The TigersbeatVirginia Techin the other national semifinal.

It’s theTigers’ first appearance in the title game as well, as Kim Mulkeybecame the second coach to take two different teams to thechampionship game.

Caitlin Clark's NCAA Tournament so far:Rd. of 64: 26 PTS | 12 AST | 7 REBRd. of 32: 22 PTS | 12 AST | 3 STLSweet 16: 31 PTS | 8 AST | 3 REBElite Eight: 41 PTS | 12 AST | 10 REBFinal Four: 41 PTS | 8 AST | 6 REBARE YOU SERIOUS 🤯 pic.twitter.com/drWn36Z9nt

— BasketballNews.com (@basketbllnews) April 1, 2023

Thanks to thespectacular play of Clark and the historic year by South Carolina,this was one of the most talked about and highly anticipatedmatchups in women’s Final Four history.

The gamelived up to the hype surrounding it — the best player vs. the bestteam — much to the delight of the sellout crowd of over 19,000fans.

Coach DawnStaley and South Carolina (36-1) had won 42 in a row, includinglast year’s championship game.

This wasIowa’s first appearance in the Final Four in 30 years. The lasttime the Hawkeyes advanced this far was 1993 and C. Vivian Stringerwas the coach of that team that lost to Ohio State in overtime.

Clark wowedthe crowd that included Harper Stribe, a young fan of the team whohas been battling cancer. She was featured in a surprise video thatinformed the Hawkeyes’ star that she was the AP Player of theYear.

Trailing59-55 entering the fourth quarter, South Carolina scored the firstfive points to take the lead. Clark answered right back with twodeep 3-pointers and an assist to Monika Czinano to give theHawkeyes a 67-62 lead.

SouthCarolina got within 69-68 on Raven Johnson’s 3-pointer before Clarkgot a steal for a layup with 3:32 left. Neither team scored againuntil star Aliyah Boston was fouled with 1:37 left. She made thesecond of two free throws.

Clark thenscored another layup on the other end out of a timeout to make it afour-point game. After a layup by Zia Cooke made it a two-pointgame with 58 seconds left, the Hawkeyes ran the clock down withMcKenna Warnock grabbing a huge offensive rebound off a Clark misswith 18 seconds remaining.

Clark hit twofree throws after South Carolina fouled her with 13.5 seconds left.They were her 38th and 39th point, moving her past Nneka Ogwumikefor the most points scored in a Final Four semifinal game.

After aputback by Johnson with 9.9 seconds left got the Gamecocks within75-73, Clark sealed the game with two more free throws.

As the finalseconds went off the clock, Clark threw the ball high in the airand galloped around the court.

The lossended a spectacular season for the defending champion Gamecocks,who were trying to become the 10th team to go through a seasonunbeaten.

Cooke led theGamecocks with 24 points. Slowed by foul trouble, Boston had justeight points and 10 rebounds as the Hawkeyes packed the paint,daring South Carolina to shoot from the outside.

The Gamecocksfinished 4-for-20 from behind the 3-point line and couldn’t takeadvantage of their 49-25 advantage on the boards that included 26offensive rebounds.