Asked about Syracuse’s size advantage against Monmouth, Quentin Hillsman’s face lit up with an enormous smile.

The Syracuse head coach Hillsman had seen Monmouth’s roster and watched film of their severely undersized starting lineup. None of the Hawks starters were taller than 6 feet, creating a major mismatch with the Orange’s lanky 6-foot-5 leading scorer in Kayla Alexander.

And once Hillsman saw those Hawks in person, the excitement for that matchup grew to another level.

‘Yes, very excited,’ he said postgame with that big smile. ‘When we can throw the ball underneath the rim and just have (Alexander) stand and put the ball up. It’s a big advantage.’

Syracuse (23-9) pounded Monmouth (23-10) inside to run away with a 77-53 victory Thursday inside the Carrier Dome in the first round of the Women’s National Invitational Tournament. Alexander finished with 26 points and nine rebounds to power the Orange to the win in front of 208 fans.

The Hawks stuck with SU, even taking a lead into halftime, but Syracuse’s full-court press triggered a suffocating second-half defense that held Monmouth to just 4-of-28 shooting after the break. And SU continued to dominate down low throughout the action.

The Orange advances in the WNIT to take on St. Bonaventure (21-11) Monday at 7 p.m. in the Carrier Dome.

‘It’s a big advantage that we knew we had,’ Hillsman said of SU’s size. ‘And its something that no matter how good a team they were, we’ve got 6-foot-5 and you’ve got 6-foot guarding it. It’s going to be a big advantage.’

Syracuse went to Alexander in the paint from the opening tip. The sophomore center got touches on seven of SU’s first eight possessions, going 3-for-5 for six points.

The one time Alexander didn’t get the ball down low, she was called for a three-second violation. And Hillsman almost lost it on the sideline.

‘She’s wide open,’ he yelled at his players. ‘She is wide open. Wide open.’

As SU’s leading scorer dominated the offensive end, Monmouth pulled in front with a solid offensive performance of its own. The Hawks used long possessions and good shooting late in the shot clock to build leads of 11 and eight points before the break. They hit 7-of-17 3-pointers in the first half.

But SU turned things around just less than three minutes before halftime when Hillsman brought out a 2-2-1 full court press. And sophomore guard Elashier Hall said that flustered Monmouth just enough.

‘It was kind of unexpected,’ she said. ‘… It was kind of out of the blue, spur of the moment. They dealt with it as best that they could at the moment.’

Although it didn’t directly lead to many turnovers or steals, that press seemed to get to the Hawks offensively.

Monmouth started the game shooting 13-of-26 from the field and took a 33-25 lead with 2:50 left in the first half. After that, when SU started its full-court defense, the Hawks shot just 4-for-32 from the field, scoring 20 points in the final 22:50.

‘We were way more active moving our feet (in the second half),’ said sophomore Carmen Tyson-Thomas, who finished with 15 points. ‘And we were getting to the spots where we needed to go in our zone.’

And as the Hawks offense sputtered, Alexander and the Orange continued to take advantage of their size and length. In addition to Alexander’s 26 points, junior forward Iasia Hemingway added 15 and redshirt freshman Shakeya Leary tallied 10 from down low.

‘We got scout ahead of time and coach told us that there was no one over six feet,’ Alexander said. ‘So I was kind of expecting it.’

And although Hillsman was expecting his Orange to be prepping for the NCAA tournament rather than battling to advance in the NIT, he was happy Syracuse avoided a major letdown in the opening round.

‘We believe we belong in the tournament and we didn’t get in,’ Hillsman said. ‘But we knew that we needed to come out and win a basketball game. We just wanted to extend our season. We wanted to just keep playing.’

zjbrown@syr.edu

Published on March 16, 2011 at 12:00 pm