City of Basketball Love

Owen McCue (@Owen_McCue)
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OLNEY — When asked whether a boost in the rebounding department may have helped his team on Saturday afternoon against UMass, La Salle women’s basketball Mountain MacGillivray coach was quite blunt.

“Today, more opportunities might have just meant more missed shots,” MacGillivray said. “It was that kind of day. I don’t think we failed to get ourselves extra possessions. We took 60 shots, they took 54. That should be a recipe for winning a basketball game, typically, but sometimes it’s not and that’s just the way it goes. That’s basketball.”

La Salle slowed the A-10’s top scoring offense but shot just 25 percent from the field and 3-of-27 from 3-point range in a 66-42 loss. 

“If we have a bad shooting game, not a monumentally bad shooting game, we’re in the game at the end,” MacGillivray said. “We shoot 32 percent, 33 percent, which is terrible and it’s a good game down the stretch.”

La Salle (14-10, 5-4 A-10) held the Minutewomen, who came in averaging a league best 75.7 ppg heading into Saturday, scoreless through the game’s first five-plus minutes, yet still trailed 9-7 after a quarter of play. 

Senior Sydney Taylor, who finished with 26 points and 10 rebounds, helped get the UMass (19-4, 9-1) offense going in the second quarter and her team went into halftime with a 32-21 lead. The Explorers trimmed the deficit to seven, 40-33, with 2:10 left in the third quarter on a three by graduate guard Molly Masciantonio but UMass rattled off 11 straight points to extend its lead to 18 with 8:10 to play and run away with the game.

Masciantonio stuffed the statsheet with nine points, four rebounds, four steals, two assists. Freshman Mia Jacobs added nine points, four steals and three boards.

After five straight A-10 victories, Saturday was La Salle’s second consecutive loss. The Explorers shot 3-of-23 from deep in a loss to VCU on Wednesday. They hope to remedy those struggles next Wednesday at Richmond.

“The types of shots we take, probably not the ones off the dribble,” Mia Jacobs said of potential solutions to the shooting woes. “The kick out ones are probably our best bet, highest percentage wise. Layups that aren’t contested or one person on us instead of two, dump downs, stuff like that.”

Box Score

MBB: Monmouth 69, Drexel 67
Two days removed from a shocking home win over first-place College of Charleston, Drexel (13-11, 7-5 CAA) dropped a game to the Colonial Athletic Association’s last place team. The Dragons led 42-30 at halftime but saw that advantage slip away quickly as Monmouth (4-20, 3-8 CAA) started the second half on an 18-3 run and took a 48-45 lead with 14:10 to play. 

The two teams exchanged the lead nine times and had five ties the rest of the way — the largest advantage a 66-61 Drexel lead on a Jamie Bergens three with 4:59 to play. Three straight free throws from Phelps product Jack Collins put Drexel ahead 67-66 with 1:34 to play. Amari Williams tied the game with a split at the line for the Dragons, but Myles Foster came back down and was fouled for Monmouth. His two free throws at the one-minute mark were the final points of the game.

Tahron Allen led Monmouth with 19 points, followed by 15 from Foster and 12 from Collins. Luke House led Drexel with 18. Bergens and Lamar Oden Jr. both scored 13 and Williams, who missed a go-ahead three at the buzzer, added 12 points and 16 rebounds. 

Box Score

WBB: No. 19 Villanova 78, Butler 58
The Wildcats’ one-two punch of senior forward Maddy Siegrist and sophomore guard Lucy Olsen was it again as the Wildcats’ cruised to their 11th win in 12 games. Siegrist scored 31 points on 13-of-19 shooting and Olsen added 18 points and five assists in a game Villanova (20-4, 11-2 Big East) was in control from the start. Olsen has 16-or-more in her last five games, shooting 50 percent from the field during the stretch.

Sophomore forward Christina Dalce added a 13-point, 10-rebound double-double for Villanova. The sophomore matched her season-high in points for the second game in a row and her second straight double-double.

Box Score

WBB: Houston 65, Temple 60

The Owls (10-12, 5-5 AAC) saw their three-game win streak halted in a nail-biter against the Cougars (9-13, 6-3 AAc) on Saturday. Temple led 29-26 going into halftime, but Houston outscored the Owls 19-11 in the third to take the lead. The Owls trailed 59-52 with 3:03 to play but sliced that lead all the way down to one, 61-60, with nine seconds left on a pair of free throws by Tiarra East.

Houston Laila Blair knocked down a pair of free throws to put the Cougars back up three, but Temple never got a chance to tie, turning the ball over before attempting a shot. East had a team-high 16 points along with eight rebounds and four assists. Aleah Nelson added 15 points and five assists, and Caranda Perea chipped in a 10-point, 13-rebound double-double.

Box Score

WBB: Penn 67, Cornell 54
The Quakers (14-8, 6-3 Ivy) bounced back from a Friday night loss to Columbia with a runaway win over Cornell (9-13, 2-7) on Saturday to stay in fourth place in the Ivy. Penn led 22-13 after one quarter and ran away with things with a dominant third quarter (21-6) to take a 56-32 lead into the fourth. Kayla Padilla and Jordan Obi shined in the win. Padilla scored 23 points on 8-of-12 shooting and tallied six rebounds and four assists. Obi was 10-fo-12 from the floor for 21 points and grabbed seven boards. Simone Sawyer added seven points and four steals.