saint paul, minn. - the golden bears (18-9, 16-6 nsic) are back in the nsic tournament semi finals for the seventh consecutive year after pulling out a victory over a feisty minnesota duluth (15-12, 13-9 nsic) team on wednesday night 65-56. maurika hickman led all scores with 22 points on the night. Hickman did not have her best shooting night as the nation's second best three point shooter went 0-5 from behind the arc. jodi batzel and jineen williams each poured in 10 points to help cu out. box score
hickman helped cu pull away at the end of the game as she scored the final nine points for cu. Hickman also dished out four assists on the night. Umd flexed their muscles on the offensive glass as they had 19 offensive rebounds. A big part of that was kelsey hewitt and katrina newman who combined for 13. Hewitt and newman each finished with double-doubles going for 17-14 and 12-11 (points-rebounds) respectively.
concordia and minnesota-duluth both came out flat in tonight’s game, struggling to run their offense efficiently and make open shots. The game went back in forth with concordia holding onto a slim lead up until the 9 min mark left in the first half. A fast break lay-up by senior guard zoraa quoie sparked the golden bears as they went on a 10-0 run to take a 26-16 lead with 5:30 left in the first half. Duluth answered with an 8-0 run of their own to come within 4 points as the halftime score sat at 26-22 in favor of the golden bears.
the bulldogs struggled on the offensive end shooting only 27%, but held an edge in rebounding and second chance points. Umd built up a 21-15 rebounding edge while outscoring the golden bears 5-0 on second chance points. However concordia’s defense kept them ahead by forcing 11 first half turnovers and holding a 12-0 advantage in fast break points. The golden bears managed to shoot a mere 41% from the field and were only 1-11 from three point range, which proved to be their achilles heel in that first half.
the second half started much differently than the first with both teams bringing good energy. Stingy defense on both sides kept the game close as the golden bears and umd traded the lead back and forth for the first 14 min of the second half. Neither team held a lead higher than 4 points.
a three pointer by carissa wolyniec extended the golden bears lead out to 5; concordia never gave that lead back. A jumper by duluth’s lindsay miller brought the bull dogs to within 3 moments but after rachel hanson went 1-2 from the free throw line the lead was back to 4. Minnesota duluth’s courtney doucette answered with a layup to cut concordia’s lead to 2. It then became the maurika hickman show as she took over, scoring the last 9 points for the golden bears. A three point play and 4 straight free throws put the game out of reach giving cu the 65-56 victory.
hickman lead the way for the bears scoring 22 points on 8-16 shooting. Minnesota duluth’s kelsey hewitt pulled down a double-double with 17 points and 14 rebounds helping give umd a 18-2 advantage in second chance points. 19 turnovers for the bulldogs lead to 22 points for concordia and proved to be a deciding factor in the victory.
the golden bears will move on to face northern state, who ended concordia’s 13 game win streak just a few short weeks ago, in the nsic tournament finals. That game will be on saturday, at 5 p.m., in the gangelhoff center.
photos by trevor saylor | trevor saylor flickr
