The Brandeis women’s basketball team crushed visiting Eastern Nazarene College (ENC) 64-38 on Dec. 5, winning their second game in a row and improving their season to 5-4. The ENC Lions fall to 4-4. This game did not affect Brandeis’ conference standings.
The Judges spent the first quarter neck and neck with the Lions; with 12:13 left in the first half, the Lions led with 13-12. After nearly four scoreless minutes, Judges’ guard Diana Cincotta ’12 made a fast-break lay-up, putting the Judges ahead. The Judges maintained this lead for the rest of the game.
At approximately the five-minute mark, the teams traded three-pointers on three-straight possessions, and guard Morgan Kendrew ’12 scored a basket between two from Lions’ rookie guard Kori Sorenson, bringing the score to 21-19 Judges, just 4:44 before the break.
The Judges then outscored ENC 10-2 for the rest of the half, going into the break with a lead of 31-21, which would prove insurmountable for the Lions.
Just more than eight minutes into the second half, the Judges had outscored the lions 16-6, leading the Judges to dominate the Lions by 20 points, with a score of 47-27; six of the Judges’ 16 points came from Kendrew.
Not only were the Lions unable to take the lead again but they never even approached taking the lead again; the Judges beat the Lions 64-38, a 26-point lead.
Cincotta led the Judges points-wise for a second-straight game with 13 points, 11 of which she scored in the first half. Cincotta hit 5-of-8 overall with a three-pointer and two free throws. Kendrew was a close second, however, in her first start of the season, with 11 points on 5-of-9 with a trifecta.
Reserve Kasey Dean ’14 led the Judges with eight rebounds and guard Hannah Cain ’15 led the Judges with seven assists, matching her career-high, and helping the Judges set a season-high with 20 assists on 26 baskets.
ENC was led by junior forward Shardae Brown, who scored 11 points—six after the break—and collected six rebounds. Sorensen contributed nine points off the bench, hitting 3-of-6 from beyond the arc. Sophomore forward Dianna Bonds tied with Brandeis’ Dean for game-high honors with eight rebounds while also leading the Lions with two assists, two blocks and two steals.
Brandeis outshot ENC in field goals at 40.6 percent (26-of-64) as opposed to ENC’s 25.4 percent (16-of-63), despite the fact that both teams were tied at 49 rebounds apiece. What truly allowed Brandeis to pull ahead were their 20 assists, as opposed to ENC’s five, and the fact that they only had 13 turnovers, which resulted in five points for ENC, as opposed to ENC’s 22 turnovers, which resulted in 10 points for Brandeis.
Earlier in the week, the Brandeis University women’s basketball team rallied from an early 12-point deficit in the first half en route to a convincing 75-59 win over Daniel Webster College. Cincotta led the Judges with a career-high 20 points as she paced her team to a non-conference victory.
Daniel Webster raced out to a surprising 29-17 lead about 11 minutes into the game behind streaky three-point shooting. The Eagles drained seven of their first 10 three-pointers, including back-to-back three-balls from senior forward Ali Chojnacki, to gain their early 12-point lead. Both senior guard Alyca Gervais and rookie guard Allyssa Marson also knocked down a pair of three-pointers to help the visiting Eagles in the early stages of the game.
After a time-out by head coach Carol Simon, the Brandeis defense tightened up on the Eagles’ perimeter shooting. The Judges outscored Daniel Webster, 21-6, for the rest of the first half holding the Eagles to 2-of-13 shooting with the only two shots coming from deep beyond the arc. During the same run, the Judges also held a 13-7 advantage on the glass. Kendrew grabbed four of the 13 rebounds during the stretch to help the Judges re-establish momentum.
On the offensive side of the ball, seven different Brandeis players paced the scoring. Back-to-back shots from beyond the arc from guard Janelle Rodriguez ’14 and Cincotta put the Judges on top, 33-32, with 2:37 left in the first half. Daniel Webster sophomore guard Jennifer Fredericks responded with the Eagles’ ninth three-pointer of the contest, but Brandeis guard Cain finished the half with a traditional three-point play off of an offensive rebound and put back to give the Judges a 38-35 lead at the half. Gervais, Chojnacki and senior guard Sarah Paternostro led Daniel Webster with eight points each while Brandeis forward Samantha Anderson ’13 had eight points and eight rebounds.
Daniel Webster made an early run to tie the game at 41-41 after a Paternostro layup less than four minutes into the second half; however, Brandeis quickly responded, scoring 10 of the game’s next 11 points, including six from Kendrew. A jumper from Kendrew off of an assist from Dean made it a 51-42 game. Though Daniel Webster scored the next four points to pull within five, 51-46, with 10:29 left in the contest, the Eagles only managed to score two field goals for the rest of the game as the Judges pulled away. Cincotta helped put the Eagles away by scoring eight-straight points during the final 10 minutes of the game. The Brandeis lead expanded to as many as 21 points before two late field goals cut the Brandeis lead to 16 points.
Cincotta scored 14 of her career-high 20 points in the second half. She connected on 5-of-10 from the field including 3-of-7 from beyond the arc. Anderson also had a strong performance finishing with 10 points and a career-high 15 rebounds for her first collegiate double-double with nine of her 15 rebounds coming on the offensive glass. The Judges systematically dominated the Eagles on the boards out-rebounding them 53-25, including 22-5 on the offensive glass, which in turn gave the Judges a 21-2 edge in second-chance points.
Kendrew finished with 10 points and seven rebounds, one shy of a career-high, while guard Kelly Ethier ’12 and Cain each tallied six assists tying and setting personal-highs respectively. Center Courtney Ness ’13 blocked three shots as the Judges blocked an impressive eight shots during the contest.
Daniel Webster had four players in double figures. Paternostro led the team with 18 points, scoring 10 points in the second half, to go along with a team-high five assists. Gervais finished with 15 points and led the visitors with six rebounds. Both Paternostro and Gervais shot 3-of-6 from three-point range for the game. Marson scored 11 points off of the bench and Chojnacki chipped in 10 points as the pair combined for five three-pointers.
Brandeis returns to action again Saturday at 1 p.m. with another non-conference game at Roger Williams University.
