Red Flash Down Hawks to Make it Five Straight
LORETTO, Pa. (Feb. 2, 2009) – It was a ground hog day the Saint Francis women’s basketball team would love to repeat as Allison Daly (Harrisburg, Pa./Trinity) put up 16 points and the team shot 41.8 percent from the floor to down the Monmouth Hawks 64-48 for their fifth consecutive win at DeGol Arena on Monday night.
The win, combined with a Quinnipiac loss, moved the Red Flash into fourth place in the Northeast Conference. The team improved to 7-13 overall and 6-4 in the NEC.
Saint Francis started the game on a 12-1 run, not allowing a Monmouth field goal until Laura Forbes hit a jumper with 13:42 remaining in the first half. Another jumper by Marisa Jimenez and a successful trip to the free-throw line by LaKia Barber brought the score to 12-7, keeping the Hawks in the game.
Daly sunk a three-pointer and Brittany Lilley (Severna Park, Md./Severna Park) put up a lay up to put the Flash up by seven, and Samantha Leach (Mount Sterling, Ohio/Miami Trace) added another three to put the score at 24-16 with a little over three minutes left in the first half.
The game stayed close for the next few minutes, with the teams trading field goals until Quinessa Johnson (West Chester, Ohio/Lakota West) made a jumper with one second left in the half to give SFU a five-point cushion going into the locker room.
Though they held the Hawks offense to a shooting percentage of just 29 percent, the Red Flash came out of the locker room ready to make some improvements. After being out-boarded by Monmouth 20-18 in the first half, Saint Francis battled hard under the net and came away as the leader in boards 44-39 by the end of the game.
"I kind of challenged them," said head coach Susan Robinson Fruchtl after the game. "‘Do you guys want to continue to lead this conference in rebounding? Because you’re going up against the second best rebounding team in the conference. You’ve got to make a statement here and step up and continue to do that part that we normally do so well.’ So they rose to the challenge."
Janie Killian (Verona, Pa./Penn Hills) got the half started off right for the Flash with a lay up just nine seconds in. A Daly three-pointer and a jumper by Leach gave SFU a 12-point advantage. Jiminez made a free-throw shot for the Hawks and Barber had another successful trip to the line to shrink their deficit back down to single digits.
Consecutive three-point shots by Britney Hodges (Dayton, Ohio/Mount de Chantal) and Leach put Saint Francis up 40-27 with 14:13 left in the game. Hodges was sent to the free-throw line and came away with two to increase the lead to 14 points.
The Red Flash stayed on top of things, and another three-pointer by Hodges gave them a 19-point advantage, their biggest of the evening. Barber put up four points to cut into the lead, but Daly sunk yet another three-point shot to put SFU up by 18. Barber was able to score a last minute field goal, but it was far from enough as the Flash took the game 64-48.
Monmouth was lead by Barber, who put up a double-double with 22 points and 10 rebounds. Jimenez was the only other player to come close to double-digits, putting up an eight point effort. They were limited to a 30.5 field goal percentage and just 3 assists by a stellar effort from the Red Flash defense. They finished the night 2-for-11 from beyond the arc.
SFU, who shot 41.8 percent from the field and 47.4 from beyond the arc, were led by Daly who had 16 points and seven boards. Hodges was also in the double-digits with 14 points, and was 3-of-4 in three-pointers. Leach was also a factor in the scoring with 10 points, seven rebounds and six assists. Just missing out on her fourth double-double of the season was Killian, who ended up with nine points and nine rebounds, as well as three blocks.
The Red Flash hit the road next weekend for a noon match up with Wagner at 1 p.m. on Staten Island. The team will then head east to New Britain for a Monday night contest with Central Connecticut State, with tip-off set for 7 p.m.
"Every game is going to be tough," said Robinson Fruchtl. "When you get up in the standings teams are going to come after you even harder. And that will be our new position for our kids. We’ve got to do the things that we do well. We’ve got to use our speed, we’ve got to rebound. We’ve got to take care of the basketball. We have to keep executing on offense. I think we’ve grown a lot offensively and defensively. Things just look nicer out there when we’re on offense."