At this time of year “survive and advance” is everyone's motto, particularly the favorites who are trying to avoid conference playoff upsets. On Friday night three NCAA participants from a year ago did that, barely.
Cortland State held a 10-point lead with under four minutes left, but had to withstand an Oneonta State rally for a 67-65 win. Oneonta cut the lead to two and had the ball with 16 seconds left, but Cortland's Maggie Byrne got the steal to preserve the victory. Jessica Laing became the first sophomore in Cortland women's basketball to reach the 1,000 point milestone.
No. 21 Lake Forest needed overtime but moved past Carroll 69-64 in the MWC semifinals. St. Lawrence needed two extra sessions but did the same, beating Hamilton 75-70. Friday's women's scores
&&g-boxl&&Denison, which played in the NCAA tournament last year, was the underdog playing at Kenyon. But the Big Red pulled off the upset 43-41, ending the Ladies' 17 game win streak and ousting them from the NCAC tournament for the fourth consecutive year.
No. 12 Kean needed no such dramatics to finish its convincing run through the NJAC field. After trouncing William Paterson by 28 in the semifinals, the Cougars broke out to a 17 point half time lead and eased past TCNJ 70-61. Tiffany Patrick (10 points, 14 rebounds) and Chari' Cooper (10 points, 18 rebounds) each picked up double-doubles in the win.
No. 22 Puget Sound joined Kean and Baruch as the early entrants in to the NCAA tournament by defeating No. 18 George Fox 62-52 in the NWC championship. Marissa Cain scored 20 points and grabbed six rebounds and the Loggers claimed their third consecutive NCAA Tournament appearance.
Along with the team heroics, the semifinals also saw some spectacular individual performances. Dani Dudek registered her fifth triple-double (12 points, 12 assists, 10 rebounds) of the year in Stevens' 84-65 victory over St. John Fisher. Dione Eccles poured in 54 points to push Greensboro past Ferrum 117-113 in double-overtime. Marissa Clark upped her career assist total to 642, placing her in the top 10 all-time, as No. 16 Medaille stormed past Penn State-Behrend 50-26.
All-American Lindsay Ippel extended her college career at least one more game with a late free throw that proved the difference in Millikin's 49-48 win over Carthage. The Big Blue meet No. 9 Illinois Wesleyan as part of Saturday's jam-packed championship action.
In the ASC tournament, all four West Division teams survived and advanced against their East Division opponents. Mary Hardin-Baylor nipped host UT-Tyler 75-74 to complete the sweep.