Moon Township, PA – The Wagner women's basketball continues its two-game Western Pennsylvania road swing when the Seahawks meet Robert Morris in a 5:00 p.m. tip on Monday night at 7:00 p.m. in the first game of a doubleheader with the Green & White and Colonial men's teams set to play at 7:30 p.m.
The injury-riddled Seahawks, who have only dressed six players in each of the last six games, opened Northeast Conference (NEC) play on Saturday by dropping a 93-78 decision at Saint Francis U despite a 42-point outburst by junior guard
Jasmine Nwajei (Rockaway Park, NY/Murry Bergtraum).
The Seahawks (2-10, 0-1 NEC) will be facing a Robert Morris team which enters Monday's contest with at 7-5 overall, 1-0 in NEC play, following a 78-63 home win over Sacred Heart on Saturday, and riding a three-game winning streak.
SCENE-SETTERThis will be the 59
th all-time meeting for these longtime NEC rivals and Wagner holds a 31-27 lead, including a
66-60 win at RMU on March 2, 2015 in the 2014-15 season finale. The Colonials have won 18 of the last 20 meetings, but the teams have split the last four meetings. Wagner is 14-13 all-time at the Charles L. Sewall Center.
Jasmine Nwajei is interviewed on espn3.com following
last season's win at Robert MorrisABOUT WAGNERIn a game that featured nine lead changes and eight ties, Saint Francis U used a late run to pull away for a 93-78 win over the Seahawks on Saturday in the NEC opener for both teams. Nwajei poured in 42 points vs. the Red Flash to improve her scoring average to 23.2 ppg., which is second in the NEC. The 5-8 guard accounts for 40.1 percent of the Seahawks' points so far this season, as Wagner averages around 56.8 points per game with the 78 vs. SFU being a season high. Minus three key players of late who are sidelined by injury in senior guard
Jordyn Peck (8.8 ppg.), fifth-year senior guard
Alexis Smith (Medford, NY/St. John the Baptist), a University of Illinois transfer averaging 7.3 ppg., and freshman guard
Julia McClure (Secaucus, NJ/Secaucus) who checks in at 2.0 ppg., Wagner is shooting just .335 overall and .265 in three-point shooting.
ABOUT RMURobert Morris, which earned seven first-place votes in the 2015-16 NEC Preseason Poll and was selected first in the preseason poll for the third straight season, is led in scoring by guard Anna Stamolamprou who checks in at 13.7 ppg. The Colonials have five players who average between 7.7 and 13.7 points in Rebeca Navarro (9.3), Megan Smith (8.8), Ashley Ravelli (8.6) and Mikalah Mulrain (7.7). Navarro leads the nation in three-point percentage, converting at 55.6 percent this season. She has hit six of her last seven from long range and is 25-45 this season. Navarro is fourth all-time at Robert Morris shooting .384 from beyond the arc for her career. The 2015-16 season will be the last for 13th year RMU head coach Sal Buscaglia who will retire at the conclusion of the season after 38 years on the bench. He had won 699 games at four different schools and has 430 wins as a Division I coach.
LAST TIME OUTDespite
Jasmine Nwajei's 42-point effort, Saint Francis U was able to break open a close game down the stretch in posting a 93-78 win in the Northeast Conference (NEC) opener for both teams on Saturday. This was a nip-and-tuck affair most of the way as Wagner (2-10, 0-1 NEC) trailed by just two points at the half, 47-45, and after three quarters of play, at 65-63, before the Red Flash (3-9, 1-0 NEC) outscored the Seahawks 28-15 in the fourth quarter in posting the 15-point win. For the game, there were eight ties and nine lead changes. Leading by that 65-63 count entering the final quarter, SFU opened the fourth with a 9-0 run, fueled by five of a team-high 35 points from Jessica Kovatch, in taking a 72-63 lead, as the freshman guard capped the run with a three-pointer at the 8:05 mark. Junior guard
Lyndsay Rowe (South River, NJ/St. John Vianney) countered with an old-fashioned three-point with 7:44 left to make it a two-possession game at 72-66. The 5-9 Kovatch then broke loose again, scoring all eight Red Flash points during an 8-0 run, as SFU pushed the lead to 14 at 80-66 with 4:50 left en route to the win. In posting her fourth 30-point plus game of the season, Kovatch was 13-of-23 from the field and is now averaging an NEC-leading 23.6 ppg. Katie Reese and Maya Wynn added 16 and 12 points, respectively, for the Red Flash who out-shot Wagner 40.7 percent to 36.5 percent. The 78 points recorded by Wagner is a season high as the Seahawks placed three players in double figures. In addition to Nwajei's 42, sophomore guard
Tanasia Russell (Vineland, NJ/Vineland) tallied a career-high 15 points with 13 of those coming in the first half. Rowe also provided a spark offensively, tossing in a season-high 13 on 5-of-9 shooting, to go with four assists and four rebounds. Sophomore forward
Sofia Roma (Richmond Hill, NY/Nazareth Regional) was a huge force on the boards this afternoon, corralling 16 rebounds in addition to totaling eight points. For the 6-2 Roma, the 16-rebound affair is two shy of her career-high 18 caroms, which she grabbed in last season's NEC opener vs. SFU (1/3/15) and equaled in the 69-48 victory over Lafayette back on December 9. In addition to the five boards grabbed by Nwajei and Rowe, senior guard
Jazmine Hamlet (New York, NY/Francis Lewis) matched her season high by tracking down seven rebounds as Wagner held a 51-47 edge on the glass.
NWAJEI CONTINUES HER TORRID, RECORD-BREAKING SCORING FORMJasmine Nwajei, who totaled a school-record 45 points vs. Stony Brook (12/18) which bettered the Seahawk all-time single-game scoring mark of 43 set by Stephanie Samuels vs. Fairleigh Dickinson in 1985, is second in the conference scoring race at 23.2 ppg., following a 42-point outburst on Saturday at SFU which is the third-leading scoring effort in Seahawk history. The lightning-quick Nwajei shot 15-of-38 from the floor vs. the Red Flash, including a 5-of-15 effort from three-point range. One of the
"NCAA.com Starting Five"" Players of the Week and a two-time NEC Player of the Week this season, added three rebounds and three steals. The outing at SFU for Nwajei, the nation's No. 2 scorer a year ago at 24.8 ppg., marked the fourth time this season, and 14
th time in her career, that she has hit for 30 or more points in a game. With her 42 points at SFU, Nwajei moved into sixth place on the Seahawk all-time scoring list with 1,513 points, passing Hall of Fame member Susan Moffat (1,481 points - 1994-98). Next on the list is another Hall of Famer, Amanda Young (1995-99), who amassed 1,550 points in her career.
NWAJEI IN SIXTH PLACE ON WAGNER ALL-TIME SCORING LIST
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