Three days ago, Brandeis suffered its first loss of the season to conference rival NYU. Tuesday was Brandeis chance to rebound from that heartbreaker by taking on regional arch-rival Tufts.

Despite some stretches in the game in which Brandeis nearly gave it away to Tufts, the Judges, namely Caitlin Malcolm, were too much for the Jumbos as they secured a nice rebound victory, 68-57.

Caitlin Malcolm 08 had her best game of the season;

she was unstoppable in the first half. Anytime the ball went into her hand, it was more than likely to go in. Aside from low-post dominance, Malcolm also helped push early momentum for Brandeis by hitting a three. On the defensive end, Malcolm managed to take the ball away from Tufts 4 times and pulled down 15 rebounds in the paint. All in all, she finished with 23 points in the first half, 33 total.

She was just unstoppable, Jaime Capra 08 said after the game.

Coach Simon talked about Malcolm briefly after the game.

Thats what they gave us;

we had the opportunity to get it inside. They didnt double team us too much, at the end they started to…You know when shes open, were going to get it to her.

This was most fortuitous for Brandeis because the rest of the team was out of synch for most of the game. Capra finished the game with 18 points but she struggled to find a consistent stroke for most of the game as she converted only 6 out of 19 shot attempts but was perfect at the free throw line. Late in the game Capra helped keep Brandeis in front with clutch shots when Tufts started to double-team Malcolm. Capra assessed her performance after the game.

I was a little frustrated, my shots werent falling, I was fading away from the basket. I knew I was forcing it a bit Not the best shots, but its one of those things you have to work through in the second half. Try to pick it up a bit and forget about what happened in the first half.

Tufts threatened all game long, despite only having two leads which each disappeared in 30 seconds, through steals and, at times, extremely lucky bounces. Khalliah Ummah 08 had led the team with 13 points off the bench, while Valerie Krah 07 put up 10 points and several dives.

With 3:58 left in the second half, Brandeis was only up by a basket but a time-out helped them regroup and Brandeis went on an 11-1 run in two minutes to put the game out of reach for good.

Just like in New York, turnovers threatened to leave Brandeis just short of victory. Utilizing an aggressive full-court press, Tufts forced 25 turnovers from Brandeis, with Amanda DeMartino 06 losing it 7 times while Capra, Malcolm, and Amanda Wells 09 each had 4 turnovers of their own.

The fact that they have committed 52 turnovers combined in the past two games has been a concern readily noticed by Coach Simon and the team.

The past two games, when you average 26 turnovers, thats not going to get it done, Coach Simon told the Hoot.

Still, the impact of winning following their first loss was not lost on the team. Neither was the fact that opponents were likely to start utilizing full court presses like Tufts did.

I think we just need to calm down when we get the ball. Teams are going to press us now. The past two games weve been pressured;

at NYU we had 27 turnovers, here I dont know how many we had. We need to learn to deal with the pressure better, help D-Mart (DeMartino) out a little bit more and our other guards, me included, have to step up and keep control of the ball, Capra said.

Brandeis goes off on the road to take on UAA rival Chicago on the 20th, then they go on to St. Louis to take on the new number 2 seed, Washington University. Theyll be back home on the 27th to take on Case Western.