By Pat Tintle
Assistant Sports Editor
The women’s basketball team (5-2) hosted Colgate University (0-6) on Tuesday, Dec. 2 in the Reilly Center. Despite a 30-30 tie at halftime, the Bonnies came out in the second half to outscore the Raiders 35-19, sealing their fifth victory of the season, 65-49. The Bonnies will head to Rhode Island to face Drexel on Saturday, Dec. 6 at 4 p.m. looking to continue their four-game win streak.
Coach Jim Crowley was pleased with his team’s second half performance, which began with a 6-0 run, after a competitive first half battle with the Raiders.
“It was a tale of two halves,” Crowley said. “I thought we started the game pretty well, and then, it just didn’t stay with the same aggressiveness. Some of that was on us but give a lot of credit to Colgate; I thought they played really hard. I thought they ran their stuff and put pressure on us, when (junior forward) Katie (Healy) went out with the foul trouble, we really kind of stalled offensively, and we didn’t keep the same level of defense we needed to and gave them a lot of lay-ups.”
Junior guard Nyla Rueter acknowledged that the Bonnies first half performance did not give Colgate the respect they deserve as a Division I program.
“We had to pick up our defense,” Rueter said. “We were giving them too many easy looks (in the first half), and we weren’t doing enough at the offensive end to go at the rim and get finishes at the rim. We talked about working on our basics.”
The Bonnies were up by three points with eight minutes to play in the second half, but two wide-open three-pointers from freshman guard Mariah Ruff and another triple from senior guard Ashley Zahn padded the Bonnies’ lead and ultimate victory.
Rueter led the Bonnies with a season-high 19 points to go with her five rebounds and three assists. Healy and junior forward Hannah Little finished the game with 12 points each, leaving three Bonnies starters with double-digit points.
Crowley, although facing a winless team, did not want his squad to underestimate the Raiders, who were coming off a respectable road loss to 5-0 Rutgers in Piscataway, NJ.
“I watched (Colgate) on film, and I was really impressed with how they played,” Crowley said. “They played Rutgers really tough. I knew there would be no back down in them, and I knew they were going to play hard.”
The Bonnies allowed the Raiders to shoot for 43.8 percent from the field in the first half, but after addressing the issue in the locker room, Bonaventure held Colgate to 25 percent in the second half, allowing only five baskets off 20 shots.
A big factor in the Bonnies offense was their three-point shooting. The team went 8-15 from behind the arc, a dominating 53.3 percent. Ruff’s two triples in the second half came with no second-guessing from the freshman.
“They were wide open shots,” Ruff said. “Katie (Healy) gave me great passes, and they were in my shooting pocket, so I took them.”
The Bonnies are heading to Providence, RI to take part in the Brown University Classic. If the team wins their game against Drexel (3-1), the Bonnies will face the winner of the Sacred Heart/Brown game on Dec. 7 at 4 p.m.
