With No. 7 Ole Miss and No. 5 Virginia Tech upset in the first round, two of the sport’s most dominant players are packing earlier than expected.
As the final buzzer sounded in No. 7 Ole Miss’s 75–61 upset loss to No. 10 South Dakota, Rebels center Shakira Austin found herself standing near midcourt, her hands having fallen to her knees with tears beginning to swell from her eyes. Austin, who transferred to the SEC school three years ago, led the program back to the NCAA tournament this season, its first appearance since 2007. But playing a Coyotes team making their fourth consecutive trip to the Big Dance, the weight of Friday’s circumstance proved too much to overcome.
“That’s not how I wanted to leave Ole Miss,” Austin said. “I mean it was just overwhelming. I just love my teammates and now I have to move on to the next chapter.”
Austin struggled in Friday’s defeat, sinking only three of her 16 field goals attempts. While the senior All-SEC first-team center hauled in 11 rebounds, her nine points marked her lowest output since Jan. 30. Ole Miss never led.
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Less than an hour later, and nearly 1,500 miles away, another of the country’s top centers was sent packing earlier than she had hoped. ACC Player of the Year Elizabeth Kitley did seemingly all she could to push No. 5 Virginia Tech into the second round, but No. 12 FGCU outlasted the Hokies in the waning minutes of a highly anticipated first-round matchup, and prevailed 84–81. Kitley made 16 of her 27 field goal attempts to finish with 42 points, a school record and the most by any player in an NCAA tournament loss in 22 years. Still, she was the lone Virginia Tech player to log more than 10 points.
“Stings right now because we had high aspirations for this group,” coach Kenny Brooks said afterward.
Both Kitley and Austin emerged as two of the most dominant players in the sport in recent seasons, each having learned to deal with constant double-, triple- and even occasional quadruple teams. And while the two bigs have little to show for when games have reached their highest stakes, they have also created sound foundations for their respective programs to build on.
In each of Brooks’s seven seasons with the Hokies, they’ve finished with a winning record. Still, largely as a result of Kitley’s dominance in the paint, Virginia Tech’s lone NCAA tournament appearances in that span have come the past two years. “Anytime that anybody plays her one-on-one, her numbers are astronomical,” Brooks said.
Ole Miss, meanwhile, went 0–16 in conference play just two seasons ago, having not won 10 or more games in conference play since 1992. This year was drastically different as the Rebels, with Austin as their fulcrum on both ends, went 10–6 in SEC competition and won 23 games. It explains why an appreciative Yolett McPhee-McCuin said after Friday’s loss that “people of [Austin’s] caliber don't come and say, ‘I'm going to come to this program and build.’”
Kitley sprinted to her team’s locker room moments after her 2021–22 season concluded. Following two straight NCAA tournament appearances, she will have an opportunity to make her mark again next fall, once again wanting her individual success to lift those around the program.
Austin, meanwhile, will turn to the 2022 WNBA draft, and hope that in future seasons Ole Miss is able to improve on what she helped create.
“I thanked our seniors because they came and did what I asked them to do, help me jump-start this thing,” McPhee-McCuin said. “There is a lot to be excited about. We have to continue on the journey and we’re just beginning.”
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