Lehigh University
Holy Cross
Lehigh holds on for 72-70 win over Crusaders
1/31/2009 12:00:00 AM | Women's Basketball
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The Mountain Hawks solidified their top spot in the standings by moving to 6-1 in league play and 17-5 overall, its best start since going 24-4 in 1985-86. Holy Cross drops to 4-3 in the league and 9-13 overall after the loss.
“It was nice to finally get one,” Lehigh head coach Sue Troyan said after her team had lost its previous four games to the Crusaders. “We were snake-bitten at the end of the game last year and it was nice to pull this one out.”
Holy Cross pulled to within one on a Bethany O’Dell jumper with 1:06 remaining, nearly erasing a lead that was 18 points in the first half and 15 points in the second half. It was the closest the Crusaders had been since falling behind 3-0 in the first 20 seconds of the game.
The Crusaders trailed by two points on the final possession of the game, looking for the tie or win. Alexa Williams thwarted the first attempt at a score by knocking an entry pass to Elizabeth Campbell out of bounds with six seconds to play. Holy Cross had one chance to tie the score but Briana McFadden’s jumper from 10 feet fell short and right and Lehigh held on for the win.
“We knew Holy Cross was going to make a run in the second half and they did,” Lehigh head coach Sue Troyan said. “It was a good experience for our team to be in and a good job to hold them off.”
Alex Ross put up a game-high 20 points in the win for the Brown and White, including five 3-pointers. Erica Prosser failed to score double digits for the first time in Patriot League play, but chipped in with eight points and a career-high nine assists.
The Mountain Hawks shot 50 percent form the field overall and drained nine triples in the game. Lehigh also was credited with 23 assists on its 30 made field goals, including a career-high eight from Haly Crites.
Things couldn’t have started any better for the Mountain Hawks. Less than 20 seconds after the Brown and White grabbed possession off the jump ball, Alex Ross drained a 3-pointer to give Lehigh its first lead. Seconds later, after a Holy Cross miss, Ross teed up another triple and the Crusaders were forced to call a timeout, down 6-0 just 41 seconds into the game.
“I think its definitely very important to get an early lead because we know how good Holy Cross is,” Ross said. “We knew they were going to come back so we tried to get as big a lead as possible. It’s always a game of runs so we knew we needed to come out strong.”
The three balls didn’t stop there for the Mountain Hawks, as they would go on to bury seven in the first half to open up a 45-32 halftime lead. Lehigh shot 50 percent from downtown and went 19-for-34 (55.9 percent) from the field overall in the period.
“We shot the ball real well early on,” Troyan said. “We just came out firing. They had a good shootaround this morning and seemed really focused, so going into the game we felt good.”
Ross led the way with 14 points in the period, and Crites crushed her previous career high in assists (4) by registering six dimes in the first half alone. Prosser added another eight points and five assists in the period, as Lehigh combined for 15 assists as a team in the first.
The Mountain Hawks rattled off a 13-2 run to open the game, putting the Crusaders back on their heels in the first four minutes. Ross would go on to sink four 3-pointers in the half, and even junior forward Courtney Molinaro got into the act with her first triple of the season.
The lead would grow to as much as 18 points when Melissa Rich hit a long jumper to put Lehigh up 28-10 with 10:57 left in the half. But Holy Cross battled back, as would be expected by the preseason favorite to win the Patriot League. The Crusaders put together a 7-2 run to cut the lead to just 13 points with 8:34 remaining.
The lead would drop to as little as 10 as the Mountain Hawks suffered through a stretch of foul trouble. Alexa Williams picked up three fouls in a span of 1:04 and the Brown and White reached the limit with more than eight minutes remaining in the half. Holy Cross failed to make a field goal for the final 5:48 of the period, but hit 9-of-11 free throws to stay within 13 points at the break. By the end of the game, Holy Cross would shoot 30 free throws, while the Mountain Hawks would just attempt seven freebies.
After Lehigh built the lead back up to 15 points early in the second half, the Crusaders cut the advantage to single digits on two free throws by Whitney Fremeau that made the scored 55-47 with 11:34 to play. Less than a minute later, it was Fremeau who buried a long jumper to force Lehigh to call timeout up by just six points.
The teams traded points back and forth as neither squad was able to put together a run. The Mountain Hawks got back up by double digits when Alex Ross followed her own missed jumper and sank a layup to extend the lead to 63-53 with 7:34 left. On the next possession Ross followed up her hustle play by knocking down her fifth three of the night to give Lehigh a 14-point lead.
But again the Crusaders made a run, scoring the next 10 points to pull within four points for the first time since Lehigh held a 3-0 advantage in the opening seconds. With 1:49 remaining, Bethany O’Dell sank a pair of free throws to cut the lead to 69-66 as the tension mounted on the
Trailing by three with 19 seconds left, McFadden shot a layup while taking a foul from Prosser. The ball hung on the rim but bounced out, keeping Holy Cross from tying the score. One made free throw by Alex Ross gave Lehigh the two-point buffer it would hold onto as the clock expired.
“It’s really an emotional game every time we play Holy Cross because they knocked us out of the tournament last year and the year before,” Ross said. “We just really wanted this game and we pulled it out.”
Lehigh returns to action on Saturday, Feb. 7 when the Mountain Hawks travel to
Buzzer beaters: Saturday’s win marked Lehigh’s first road win in a day game this season…It was also Lehigh’s first win at the
