Pictured Above: Redshirt freshman guard Joellen How who scored a career-high 10 points tonight
(photo by Dave Saffran)
Moon Township, PA – The Wagner women's basketball team battled first-place Robert Morris to the wire before dropping a hard-fought 49-46 decision, despite 23 points and 13 rebounds from fifth-year senior forward
Sierra Clark on Friday night.
With the loss, the Seahawks, who were coming off an
impressive 69-68 Senior Day win over Mount St. Mary's on Saturday, fall to 6-22 on the season, 4-13 in Northeast Conference (NEC) play. Of those 13 defeats, eight have come by single digits with six coming by scores of five points or less.
Wagner, which narrowly missed out on qualifying for next week's Northeast (NEC) Tournament, will close out the 2017-18 season at Saint Francis U on Sunday in a 1:00 p.m. tip.
The Colonials, meanwhile, remain tied with Saint Francis U atop the league standings at 15-2 with one game remaining in the regular season before beginning NEC tourney play next week.
After Wagner took a 20-16 halftime lead in this defensive-minded affair, the Colonials opened the second half on an 8-0 run in going on top by a count of 24-20. RMU opened its biggest lead of the second half, at 36-30, with 1:45 left on an old-fashioned three-point play by Nineka Ezeigbo.
After redshirt freshman guard
Joellen How hit a layup for two of her career-high 10 points with 1:29 left in the third quarter, RMU matched its six-point lead at 38-32 on an Ezeigbo layup. Wagner then answered with a three-pointer by freshman guard
Khaleah Dixon-Edwards with 12 seconds left in the quarter to make it a 38-35 game heading to the fourth.
The fourth quarter was similar to the first three, a nip-and-tuck, half-court affair. A layup by RMU's Megan Smith gave the Colonials the lead at 44-42 with 3:50 to play. With Wagner trailing 44-43, the Seahawks took their final lead of the game, at 45-44, on a 10-foot baseline jumper by Clark at the 1:47 mark.
After Ezeigbo hit a layup in traffic with 45 seconds left to put RMU back into the lead at 46-45, Wagner dribbled the ball up the floor before calling timeout with 39 seconds to go. Following the timeout, however, the Seahawks had trouble inbounding the ball and Clark wound up fouling out on a scramble for a loose ball with 35 seconds left.
Megan Callahan hit 3-of-4 from the line over the next 20 seconds to give RMU a 49-46 lead with 19 seconds left. With no timeouts remaining and Clark on the bench with five fouls, the ball was worked into the hands of junior Nakyila Carter whose potential last second, game-tying three-pointer rimmed out as the Colonials held on for the win.
Ezeigbo led RMU with 15 points on the night while Callahan and Nina Augustin finished with 11 points apiece.
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