Making it to the NCAA Sweet 16 for the second time in program history, the BYU women’s basketball team proved it could play with the big dogs—with the Connecticut Huskies, to be exact. It was a Cinderella matchup: no. 12–seed BYU taking on no. 1–seed UConn. BYU had previously upset North Carolina State and Nebraska to get there. “We knew that we could come in and make some noise,” says senior guard Kim Parker Beeston (’14), who drained 16 points against the Huskies. Fellow departing senior Jennifer D. Hamson (’14), the WCC Player of the Year, put up nine points, along with six blocks; standing 6-foot-7, she finished the season as the NCAA’s top shot blocker. At the half, the Cougars trailed by just one point, but the defending-champion Huskies went on to win, 70–51, concluding the Cougars’ 28-win season—the winningest season yet for BYU women’s basketball.
Photography by Jaren S. Wilkey (BA ’01)
