Rider Upsets Marist to Strengthen 2nd Place in MAAC

By Mel Greenberg @womhoopsguru

POUGHKEEPSIE, N.Y. — Subfreezing temperatures, snow-coated streets from squalls that struck a few hours earlier, yet despite the weather elements that befell this region a few hours north of the Big Apple, everything was warm and sunny inside the Rider women’s delegation following the Broncs’ 68-58 win over host Marist Wednesday night in a Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference game in the Red Foxes’ McCann Arena.

An attack in which the Broncs had four players score in double figures reversed a situation that had suddenly looked much bleaker last weekend when Rider had been upset at home by Canisius after a 7-0 start in league play.

But unbeknownst for a bit until checking the scores elsewhere Marist had been upset on the same day at home by Manhattan.

Still, it was a loss that struck the wrong time with the most daunting road swing in the MAAC about to occur with the stop Wednesday here followed by Sunday’s trip to Quinnipiac, the state of Connecticut powerhouse which often gets eclipsed by the annual national championship contending Huskies located an hour away.

Though lots of season and key games are still to play out, the rocket conference start by Rider (11-8, 7-1 MAAC) seemed on the verge of being squandered though projections be damned, that’s why they play the games.

Two seasons removed from the program-best performance that led to a postseason WNIT automatic bid as the MAAC runners up, Rider’s win here strengthened the chance that another bid could occur with the Broncs in control of their own destiny.

Under the postseason setup, the highest conference finishers who do not land in the NCAA tournament via automatic or at-large bids receive automatic entry to the WNIT with the rest of the 64-team field filled via at-large invitations.

By beating the Red Foxes (15-7, 6-3), Rider returned to a two-game lead over Marist in second and one game behind Quinnipiac, a prohibitive favorite to continue to blast its way through the MAAC.

Had the Broncs lost, they would have dropped into a tie here but on the downside of a tie-break in that deadlock for the moment.

Now, Rider has the return game with Marist still to play 10 days away on Feb. 9th, a Saturday afternoon at 2 p.m. at home in Alumni Gym in Lawrenceville, N.J., and the Red Foxes have another game still to play with Quinnipiac.

So if the Broncs can win at home on Feb. 7 to complete a sweep of Monmouth, then an ensuing  sweep of Marist would put a tiebreak in the hands of coach Lynn Milligan’s team if there is a second-place tie at the finish before the last MAAC tourney occurs at Albany, N.Y., before moving to Atlantic City (N.J.) next season.

But remember, the only given in the MAAC has been most times Quinnipiac victories, which replaced a long Marist run after the Bobcats moved over from the Northeast Conference.

And it must also be noted that Red Foxes starting point guard Grace Vander Weide, a transfer from Missouri State, is temporarily sidelined with an injury.

For now, though it didn’t seem that influential at the time, credit Milligan for a strong non-conference schedule even though the record was 4-7.

But after the home loss to Georgetown prior to the onset of the MAAC portion of the schedule, Milligan pointed out that she thought the Broncs had experienced almost anything conference rivals are likely to display.

All that said, as for the game, after an early 4-2 lead by Marist, the Broncs struck with a 7-0 run to take a lead they never relinquished.

The differential grew to 10 in the second period before dropping to three at the half. 

It was back at 10 in the middle of the third before dropping to five but each time the Broncs made strong defensive answers and in the fourth and last stanza paced by Stella Johnson who had 16 of her 18 points in the second half, it got to 13 points to secure the upset.

"Being able to come back after our loss on Saturday with a short turn around I'm very proud of our effort," Milligan said. “Both teams were in the same situation,”

The Broncs are still unbeaten on the road in conference play and the 7-1 MAAC opening record is a program-best for both Milligan, now in her 12th season, as well as better than anyone else before, topping the 6-2 eight-game start two seasons ago.

“This is a nice win for us,” Milligan continued. “To come into one of the toughest places to play in the league and get a win is big. 

“ I think defensively we did a nice job. Amari Johnson stepped up and hit some shots early on to take the pressure off Stella. We did a good job of staying within the game plan. We made some mistakes, but we were able to bounce back from them."

Stella Johnson had just two points in the first half but finished the game shooting 7-for-12 overall from the field.

“What Stella does, no matter what her points are, she does a tremendous job getting everyone else on the team involved in the game,” Milligan said.

Lea Favre shot 6-for-8 from the field and matched Stella Johnson’s team-high 18 points. Amari Johnson shot 7-for-16 and finished with 15 points and a career-high 15 rebounds for a double double.

Lexi Posset shot 4-for-7 from the field and also scored 15 points and the Broncs as a team were a near-perfect 16-for-20 from the line particularly down the stretch when the Red Foxes tried to rally.

Marist’s Alana Gilmer shot 10-for-15 from the field and had a game-high 27 points while Rebekah Hand also scored in double figures for the home team with 11 points.

Rider was able to dominate inside, 38-20, and was 12-0 on fastbreak points.

Marist swept the series between the two schools last year but Wednesday’s triumph made it two wins here in the last three years by the Broncs.

"It was really disappointing for us to come off of the loss to Manhattan and just get beaten physically and mentally,” veteran coach Brian Giorgis said. 

"Kudos to Rider. 

“You knew coming in that Lynn had them playing well. They just played a lot tougher than we did, and right now our offense is a hot mess,” he added. “We don't have anybody on the same page.

“ Unfortunately we don't have chances to practice since we have games one on top of another, but next week we'll have time to work on some things."

Looking Ahead

The Rider game was the only Guru local D-1 game on the schedule.

On Thursday, just three games are on the slate. 

Fordham, under veteran coach and former Villanova star, Stephanie V. Gaitley visits La Salle in an Atlantic 10 contest.

In the Big Ten, No. 17 Rutgers hosts reigning WNIT champion Indiana at 7 as the Scarlet Knights try to maintain their one-game lead in the conference.

Also in the Big Ten, Penn State visits No. 23 Michigan State.

On Friday, Penn and Princeton get started in their back-to-back Friday/Saturday games in the Ivy League with Penn first visiting Ciornell while Princeton is atColumbia  and the two road teams reverse their stops  on Saturday.

Villanova on Friday is back home hosting Providence in the Big East looing for a split on the season, while in the Colonial Athletic Association, Delaware is at William & Mary while Drexel visits Elon in their first meeting since Elon won at Drexel last season in the title game of the CAA tourney.

On Saturday, besides the Ivy games, Temple is at Wichita State in the American Athletic Conference as the Owls look to win their third straight following AAC wins over East Carolina and at Tulsa.

We’ll look at Sunday games to come as we cover the slate through the front part of the weekend.

And that’s the report.