Fourteen points.
That's the number redshirt senior guard Eva Hodgson put up in the fourth quarter of the UNC women's basketball team's 85-79 win over No. 18 Oregon Thursday in the Phil Knight Invitational.
After inefficient pick-and-roll play plagued the Tar Heels for most of the first half, head coach Courtney Banghart instilled a sense of fire in her team at the break.
Hodgson took it personally and put up 17 points in the second half, with 14 of those coming in the final period of play. The redshirt senior made up nearly half of UNC's offense in the final quarter, propelling the Tar Heels to their first ranked win of the year.
As the clock was ticking down, and UNC and Oregon remained neck and neck, Hodgson addressed her teammates.
“This is it — either we’re going to go on a run and win this game or we could just wait and we could lose,” Hodgson said.
Although Hodgson went into the locker room with four points, that would not last. Even after a three-point performance in the third quarter, she kept in mind a piece of advice that fueled her fourth-quarter performance.
“My coach and my teammates have been telling me all year just to shoot the ball and let it fly,” Hodgson said.
Down by one with just over five minutes remaining, junior guard Kennedy Todd-Williams grabbed a defensive rebound and began pushing the pace. She found Hodgson open right in front of the UNC bench and lobbed the ball forward, who fired from behind the arc and drained the shot.
