Kyle Adams

On Feb. 7, the University’s women’s basketball team made the long trip to Worcester, Mass. to take on Holy Cross. While this was a hard fought contest with several bright spots for the Bison, they were unable to claim the victory over their Patriot League opponent, losing by a score of 69-61 and falling to 14-9 overall (6-6 PL). The teams entered the game tied for fifth in the Patriot League Conference Standings.

Head coach Aaron Roussell’s team was led by Jacquie Klotz ’18, who recorded her first double-double of the season by scoring 20 and pulling down 13 rebounds. Klotz shined particularly brightly in the first half, tallying 15 of her points and eight rebounds in the opening half alone. Klotz, who was 8-13 from the field including 4-7 from three point range, is growing into a prolific scorer for the Bison. 

Fueled by Klotz’s torrent opening half, the Orange and Blue saw themselves in control of the game at several junctions early on, holding leads of 12-6 and 28-21 before being knocked on their heels by an 11-0 Holy Cross run to close the first half. The Bison were never able to regain the lead, although they did fight their way back to within two points on three occasions in the second half.

Other key contributors for the Bison were Audrey Dotson ’15, who racked up 15 points, and Megan McGurk ’17, who dished out five assists on the day. Claire DeBoer ’17 also put in 10 points, giving the Bison women a third double-digit scorer.

The Bison returned home on Feb. 11, where they have played well this season, boasting a record of 8-2. The Bison looked to complete a season sweep of conference-opponent, Navy, in front of their home fans. They did just that, in thrilling fashion beating the Midshipmen by a score of 51-50, improving to 15-9 on the year, the best record for the program this late in the season since 2006-07. The Orange and Blue also added another in-conference win, helping them to keep pace in the Patriot League standings with a record of 7-6.

This game was tightly contested from start to finish, with deficits remaining in the single digits for all 40 minutes of play. Other than leading by three early in the first half, the Bison trailed much of this contest, drawing back even with Navy with only 7:51 to go. Although the Bison offense outplayed Navy statistically in all shooting categories, going 43.2 percent from the field and boasting a free throw percentage over 90 percent, it was solid defense that cemented the victory, as no points were scored by either team in the final 1:49 of play. It was forward Dotson who hit the game’s decisive shot, breaking a 48-48 tie with 2:03 to go by sinking a three to put her team up 51-50. Dotson contributed 13 points and 6 rebounds in total.

The Bison women put their resilience on display, as they trailed by eight entering the second half of play. DeBoer and Klotz continued their impressive play as of late, netting 13 and 17 points respectively while combining for 13 of their team’s 31 rebounds.

Coach Roussell’s team will return to Sojka Pavilion as the Patriot League’s other service academy, Army, will look to tarnish an impressive home record for the Bison on Feb. 15. The game will be broadcast on CBS Sports Network.