By Brittany Burke
In Monday’s season home opener, the CCSU women’s Basketball team could not seem to fbnd the spark that they needed to come away with a win against the Holy Cross Crusaders.
It was a tough first half for the lady Blue Devils, who started to forge a comeback in the second half, but fell short, ending the game at 55-50.
The Blue Devils (0-2) were coming into Monday’s game hoping for their first win of the season against the Crusaders (1-1) as well as a chance to claim only their second win in a nine-game history versus Holy Cross. CCSU and Holy Cross haven’t played each other since the 1999-2000 season but the Blue Devils have not won against the Crusaders since the 1993-94 basketball season.
The Blue Devils had a rough first twenty minutes, being out-played and outscored by the Holy Cross Crusaders, 34-20. The CCSU Blue Devils began the game strongly with Leanne Crockett sinking a three-pointer, but once the lead changed, there was no coming back.
“We need to find a spark in the first half. I think that’s been our biggest problem in both games (losses against Holy Cross and the University of Maine) which is not good for our team,” said junior forward Leanne Crockett, who was the CCSU points leader with 17 points and 16 rebounds. “Our shooting percentage is way down in the first half, and we have to play a whole 40 minute game and not just 20 minutes.”
CCSU allowed for triple the amount of steals by Holy Cross than they themselves got and had 14 turnovers in the first half versus the Crusader’s five. Defensively, the Blue Devils needed to step up their game in order to have any chance of a late game comeback.
That defensive spark may just come from sophomore guard Alexzandria Dowdy. “I’m the defensive spark. That’s my plan, that’s my goal on this team,” said Dowdy.
While she is the shortest girl on the team, standing at five-foot-one, she packed a lot of punch, getting a total of four rebounds and two points in Wednesday night’s loss.
“I think Alex Dowdy was kind of a spark for us. She came in with Shontice [Simmons] and it gave us a little dimension where we can penetrate. Alex is small but she is quick getting to the rebounds,” said third-year head coach Beryl Piper.
“We need to pick it up more on defense, that’ll be our key to winning the game,” said Dowdy.
The Blue Devils did come out in the second half with the spark they had been missing offensively and defensively. The defense was able to force more turnovers by the Crusader players and CCSU outshot Holy Cross scoring 30 points to their 21.
The team did in fact have a chance to tie the game or pull ahead with under five minutes left to play, but couldn’t capitalize on all their opportunities. With 3:33 left to play CCSU was down by two, (48-46) but allowed for Holy Cross to have two free throw attempts (an area of the game they continually succeeded in making 18-21) which expanded their lead (53-46).
“We didn’t run off too well and made some poor decisions down the wire, which could’ve made the difference of us really winning that game,” said Coach Piper.
While CCSU has begun their 2009-10 season with a two game losing streak they are aware that they need to begin and end the game at full speed to have a shot at a successful post season.
“They know they’re better than that,” said Coach Piper of her team. “So they’re disappointed, and they know they gave up a great opportunity tonight.”
The Blue Devils have another shot at a home win on Wednesday Nov. 18 against Fordham at 7 p.m.
