'Heartbroken' Gamecocks hope loss fuels another title run - ESPN

TAMPA, Fla. — Raven Johnson checked out of the national title game with four minutes left to play and South Carolina down 32 points to UConn, its hopes to repeat as champions vanished.

She sat on the bench, put her head in her hands and cried. Bree Hall put her arm around her and told her to keep her head up. They had so much to be proud of, despite the result, an 82-59 loss on Sunday.

Hall approached the end to her South Carolina career pragmatically. While she hated to lose, she felt grateful for making four Final Four appearances and winning two titles. Johnson, though, put a towel over her face. She could not help but blame herself as the final seconds ticked off the clock.

«I was hurt, I was heartbroken, I was embarrassed,» Johnson said in a somber postgame locker room. «I felt like my soul got snatched. I hate losing. That's the big thing. I wanted to win so bad today and I feel like I fell short. I'm going to beat up on myself about this game because a loss just doesn't sit right with me.»

A few minutes before Johnson walked into the locker room, senior Sania Feagin stood at her locker and could not stop the flow of tears as she tried to answer a question about how much her time at South Carolina meant to her. Across the way, MiLaysia Fulwiley cried, too.

«They played harder than us,» Fulwiley said. «They played like they wanted to win the national championship. I think we didn't. They had more grit than us. They got loose balls, they ran their stuff. They didn't back down from us. We came out on the same level, but we didn't keep it up.»

Indeed, South Carolina matched UConn bucket for bucket for nearly the entire first quarter. But things started to slip away in the second quarter, when the Huskies upped their