Virginia Tech keeps rolling in March Madness, tops Tennessee

SEATTLE (AP) — Throughout this historic seasonfor Virginia Tech, coach Kenny Brooks has repeated the belief thatElizabeth Kitley is the best player for the Hokies, but GeorgiaAmoore is the most important.

It was proven again Saturday with Amoore carrying Virginia Techto a level it’s never reached before in program history.

Amoore scored a career-high 29 points and the top-seeded Hokiesadvanced to the Elite Eight for the first time in school historywith a 73-64 win over No. 4 seed Tennessee.

“I just want to win. All we have to do is keep winning to getpeople to talk about us, so we’ll keep trying to win,” Amooresaid.

The Hokies (30-4) won their 14th straight game overall andadvanced to a matchup with No. 3 seed Ohio State in the Seattle 3Regional final on Monday night. Ohio State topped UConn in thefirst semifinal, ending the Huskies’ streak of 14 straight FinalFour appearances.

Amoore and the Hokies used a dominant stretch spanning the endof the second quarter and beginning of the third that built enoughof a cushion to hold off Tennessee’s valiant rally over the final12 minutes.

Amoore attempted 19 3-pointers in the Hokies’ second-round win,but shot only 14 this time around.

“She’s only doing now what we see all the time. When the kidshave to go out and guard her, they really tighten up theirshoestrings because they know that there’s something that canhappen,” Brooks said. “But she’s phenomenal. She’s as good asanybody in the country, in my opinion. She’s playing with theutmost confidence and she’s been playing like this ever since wereally started this stretch.”

Kayana Traylor added 14 points and Kitley scored 12 pointsdespite sitting a big chunk of the first half with foul trouble.The ACC Tournament champions had reached the Sweet 16 only oncepreviously in school history and are now one win away from theFinal Four.

“I’m just so happy that I landed at such an amazing spot wherewe did exactly what we wanted to,” Kitley said. “And it hasn’t beeneasy and it’s taken coach Brooks a few years, but what he’s donewith the program and the amount of time is incredible.”

Jordan Horston led Tennessee (25-12) with 17 points. RickeaJackson scored 15 and Jordan Walker added 12.

The Lady Vols reached the regional semifinals for the secondstraight season, but haven’t been to the Elite Eight since 2016.And it was their offense that was so impressive in the first tworounds that disappeared against the Hokies.

“I felt like we were locked in and focused before the game. Wehad good energy in warmup, so nothing with that. But we just were alittle stagnant on the offensive end,” Walker said.

The Lady Vols scored 95 points in their first-round win overSaint Louis and followed up with 94 in an impressive blowout ofToledo. But Tennessee relied too much on perimeter shots early on,to the point coach Kellie Harper yelled at her team “who are we?”after attempting their 12th 3-pointer of the first half.

Tennessee made just 3 of 17 attempts from beyond the arc againstthe Hokies after making 11 of 22 in the win over Toledo.

“They did a good job with our first attack and we got reallyimpatient,” Harper said. “I thought we were really stagnantoffensively, and therefore we were settling. We took way too manythrees for us in the first half.”

The Hokies closed the first half with a flourish, scoring thefinal eight points to take a 35-22 lead at the break. Amoorestarted the second half with her fourth 3-pointer of the game andKitley scored on the interior and quickly a five-point gameballooned to a 40-22 Virginia Tech lead.

Tennessee trimmed the deficit to nine by the end of the thirdquarter and its surge continued into the fourth quarter. The LadyVols capped the 19-4 run with Jasmine Powell’s 3-pointer with 6:05left and pulled with 53-52.

But turnovers and fouls started to mount and for the Lady Volsand Virginia Tech pushed its lead back to 11 on Amoore’s jumperwith 2:10 remaining.

“It was a challenge. I’m glad we pulled away from it,” Amooresaid. “It’s what we’re going to see with Ohio State with theirpress. Glad we got a little taste of it today. Now we know.”