Women's Basketball Falls Short at American International, 54-41
SPRINGFIELD, MA - Snapping a two-game win streak, the Merrimack
women's basketball team dropped a road contest to American
International College, 54-41, Wednesday evening at the Butova
Gymnasium.
With a team-high 13 points, senior captain Casey Miller
(Fairbanks, AK) passed Karen Viglione '81 and Karem Max
'94 for 14th on the all-time scoring list (1,058) at
Merrimack.
1st
Half
Connecting on her first shot of the game, Genn Roy (Granby,
MA) nailed a three to get the Warriors on the board first,
but an 11-0 Yellow Jackets run over the ensuing seven minutes put
the visitors in an early 11-3 hole.
Against a virtually impenetrable 3-2 AIC zone, the Warriors
committed seven turnovers in the first eight minutes of play, while
living on the perimeter to shoot 1-of-7 from long range in that
time (1-of-10 in the half). The Yellow Jackets on the other
hand connected on 3-of-6 three-pointers to take an early 16-7
advantage and built it up to a 22-13 halftime lead despite shooting
just 31% (8-of-26) from the
field.
Conceding 13 turnovers in the first half, the Warriors shot 22%
(4-of-18) to score 13 points, their lowest total on the year in the
first stanza. Not all was lost as Merrimack held AIC to the
second fewest points in a half this season following their staunch
defense against Saint Anselm on Saturday (18 first half-points)
2nd
Half
The start of the second half saw the Warriors surrender five
quick turnovers which aided an 11-3 Yellow Jackets run to stretch
the lead to 17 four minutes into the half.
The Warriors would later engineer a 13-0 run behind threes from
Miller and Sarah Benischek
(Shrub Oak, NY) to cut the lead to seven (48-41) at the
5:36 mark, but cold shooting in the final five minutes (0-for-9)
and a 40-29 rebounding edge for the Yellow Jackets was too much in
the end.
"We simply need to take better care of the ball," said head
coach Helen Williams following her team's
23-turnover outing. "We have the ability, but at this point
it's mostly about polishing our fundamentals and execution."
The loss drops the Warriors to 4-9 (2-6 NE-10) on the year as
AIC improved to 5-8 (3-5 NE-10) this season.
Merrimack returns home for the first time in over a month to
host the Greyhounds of Assumption College (9-4, 6-2 NE-10) on
Saturday, January 9 at 1:00pm in the Volpe Gym. Assumption
most recently unleashed on UMass-Lowell at home, using a 58-30
first half lead to score a season-high 88 points.
