Waltham, Mass.
(February 9) -- Saint Anselm rallied to within
five in the second half before Bentley pulled away late for a 57-41
victory over the Hawks at the Dana Center on Tuesday night. The
loss drops the Hawks into 13th place in the league standings with
four regular-season games remaining.
After a three from Epiphany Smith (Springdale,
Ark.) in the early going, the Hawks jumped out to a quick
5-0 lead. The Falcons answered quickly though with a 16-3 run,
taking a 16-8 lead and forcing the Hawks to call a timeout with
10:19 left in the opening half. From that point on, neither team
did much for the remainder of the half as the two teams were a
combined 12-for-47 from the field in the half. Led by eight points
from Kelly Barrett (Middle Village, N.Y.) and
seven from Kim Brennan (Locust Valley, N.Y.), the
Falcons took a 24-10 lead into the break as they forced 14
first-half Saint Anselm turnovers.
After the Falcons made it 26-10 early in the second, the Hawks
used a 9-2 run, capped by a Megan Howard (St. Paul,
Minn.) layup, to cut the lead to single digits at 28-19
with 16:10 remaining. Saint Anselm continued to chip away and after
a three-point play by Morgan Frame (Waterville,
Maine) with 11:26 left, it was a seven-point game at
32-25. The Hawks got the lead down to five on three occasions
before five straight points from Katherine Goodwin
(Goffstown, N.H.) put the Falcons back out in front by
double digits at 42-32. The Hawks would get no closer though as the
Falcons won their 12th straight game in the series over Saint
Anselm.
Frame finished with a 15-point showing, tying her career high
set in the team's last game at Merrimack. She was joined in double
figures by Howard, who finished up with 11 points and eight
rebounds. Brennan and Goodwin finished in double figures with 15
and 11 points each, respectively, as 10 players found the basket
for Bentley.
With the loss, Saint Anselm falls to 9-14 overall and 6-12 in
the Northeast-10, while Bentley improves to 17-6 and 14-3 in the
league. Saint Anselm returns to action on Saturday afternoon,
hosting in-state rival and No. 1 Franklin Pierce for a 1:30 p.m.
start. The game is part of the NCAA's "PinkZone" program, with all
ticket proceeds being donated to the Jimmy V and Kay Yow Cancer
Foundations. The program was created to promoted breast cancer
awareness.
