{"id":40080,"date":"2024-01-29T21:41:01","date_gmt":"2024-01-30T02:41:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/?p=40080"},"modified":"2024-01-29T21:41:39","modified_gmt":"2024-01-30T02:41:39","slug":"womens-basketball-third-quarter-comeback-not-enough-for-bu-to-avenge-holy-cross","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/2024\/01\/29\/womens-basketball-third-quarter-comeback-not-enough-for-bu-to-avenge-holy-cross\/","title":{"rendered":"Women’s Basketball: Third quarter comeback not enough for BU to avenge Holy Cross"},"content":{"rendered":"

Featured image by Jacob Ireland<\/em><\/p>\n

By Luke Scotchie<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

WORCESTER, Mass. \u2014 As soon as they made it to their locker room after the halftime buzzer sounded, Boston University women\u2019s basketball (13-7, 5-4 PL) knew it would be an uphill battle to defeat Holy Cross (14-6, 8-1 PL).<\/span><\/p>\n

The Terriers had kept their deficit razor-thin throughout most of the first half. But things began to unravel once Holy Cross guard Cara McCormack sliced through BU\u2019s interior defense and tossed in a layup with 2:46 to go.<\/span><\/p>\n

After McCormack\u2019s layup, there was nothing BU could do to stop their opponents. The Crusaders scored 10 more points without letting any of the Terriers\u2019 shots touch the net before halftime. BU battled in the second half, but couldn\u2019t overcome poor shooting in a 60-51 loss to Holy Cross on Monday.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201c[Holy Cross] played a great game,\u201d BU head coach Melissa Graves said postgame. \u201cMaureen [Magarity, Holy Cross head coach] does a great job in game planning.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

But the run didn\u2019t stop the Terriers from attempting to defy the odds, no matter how few of them seemed to be in their favor. Graves rallied her troops at halftime and discussed the adjustments they needed to make.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThey went on their run and now we have to come out on the half and make a run for ourselves,\u201d Graves said. \u201cAnd so they were locked in on that, especially on the defensive side.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

When they returned to the court, the Terriers looked like a completely different team on defense. It could be said that Holy cross struggled out of the gate, but it was a gate that the Terriers would refuse to unlock.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

BU forced turnovers on each of Holy Cross\u2019 first four possessions in the second half. Very quickly, the Crusaders\u2019 seemingly-insurmountable lead had shrunk enough to become a one-possession game.<\/span><\/p>\n

But while the Terriers\u2019 defense remained impenetrable, their offense couldn\u2019t match its intensity. BU shot a season-low 29% from the field, undoing nearly all of their success on defense. It wasn\u2019t long before the Crusaders figured out the Terriers\u2019 defense, and they slowly but surely regained their massive lead as the game went on.<\/span><\/p>\n

The Terriers could not do the same.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI thought we had some good quarters and some good moments throughout the game,\u201d Graves said. \u201cIt just wasn’t consistent enough on the offensive side.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

BU did show some flashes of good offense on Monday. Senior guard Kelsi Mingo finished with 15 points and made four of her five attempts from beyond the arc, proving that 3-pointers weren\u2019t impossible to come by.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cKelsi\u2019s playing with really great confidence,\u201d Graves said. \u201cTo have somebody else that can stretch the floor and be a scorer on the floor when they are sagging in on Cait [Weimar], it\u2019s crucial for us and she’s playing really consistently, game in and game out.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

The Terriers\u2019 pick-and-roll duo of senior forward Caitlin Weimar and junior guard Alex Giannaros also found some success during this game. For as frequently as it was used on Monday, the play generated some great looks together and reflects the faith Graves has in its two operators.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cCoach has put a lot of trust in us and we try our best to produce for that,\u201d Weimar said. \u201cAnd also the team has put a lot of trust in us, which we really appreciate.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

But ultimately, it wasn\u2019t enough. Mingo\u2019s 15 points, the Terriers\u2019 staunch defense and even Weimar\u2019s 17 rebounds weren\u2019t enough to defeat Holy Cross and avenge their Patriot League title game defeat in 2023.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIt definitely is a harder loss just because of how last year went,\u201d Weimar said. \u201cBut we try our best to learn from every loss and \u2026 we\u2019ll see them again.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

The Terriers will continue on their road trip and travel to Bethlehem, Pa., where they will take on Lehigh University on Saturday at 2:00 p.m.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

But they will not go their separate ways from Holy Cross just yet. They will welcome the Crusaders to Case Gymnasium on March 2, their final home game of the regular season, for a chance to even the score with their rival.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

And the Terriers are ready for another chance.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cNot that they’ve played them and they can see, where are the ways that maybe we can beat them,\u201d Graves said, \u201cIt is a winnable game, if we can execute.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Featured image by Jacob Ireland By Luke Scotchie WORCESTER, Mass. \u2014 As soon as they made it to their locker room after the halftime buzzer sounded, Boston University women\u2019s basketball (13-7, 5-4 PL) knew it would be an uphill battle to defeat Holy Cross (14-6, 8-1 PL). The Terriers had kept their deficit razor-thin throughout […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":21480,"featured_media":39428,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[19,1039,1040],"tags":[1128,1129,69,1789,1901],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40080"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/21480"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=40080"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40080\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":40083,"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40080\/revisions\/40083"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/39428"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=40080"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=40080"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=40080"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}