The Guru Report: Delaware Falls Short, Columbia Downs Brown, No. 6 Stanford Needs Overtime to Win at Washington

By Mel Greenberg @womhoopsguru

 

There was just one game involving a local Friday night, occurring down in Newark, Del., at Delaware’s Bob Carpenter Center, where the Blu Hens in a Coastal Athletic Association game fell short 62-58 to William & Mary.

 

Elsewhere, though, there were results to draw interest here.

 

In the CAA, Towson (13-8, 5-5) won at Stony Brook 83-78 in overtime upset tightening the top of the standings, where the loss dropped the Seawolves (18-3, 8-2) into a first-place tie with North Carolina A&T (14-7, 8-2), which visits Drexel Sunday at the Daskalakis Athletic Center at 1 p.m. on Flohoops.

 

The Dragons (10-10, 5-4) sit in sixth two games in the loss column behind the frontrunners but just a game behind the three-team deadlock of Monmouth (14-7, 7-3), Charleston (15-6, 7-3), and William & Mary (11-10, 7-3).

 

The loss by Delaware (8-14, 4-6) dropped the Blue Hens to a three-way tie for tenth with Northeastern and Elon.

 

Towson, the preseason favorite sits at a two-way tie for seventh.

 

In the Delaware game, a 20-10 third quarter to the visiting Tribe became the momentum swinger enabling them to claim a two-game sweep of the season series.

 

No one on the home team scored in double figures, Tara Cousins was best with nine points, though Chloe Wilson grabbed a game-high nine rebounds.

 

In the third period, tied 32-all, the Tribe took off on a 16-5 run into the final half-minute.

 

Delaware still had chances in the final quarter rallying to a 56-56 deadlock with 2:14 left in regulation.

 

It was deadlocked again 58-58 with 46 seconds left.

 

But ten seconds after that Cassidy Geddes nailed a three-pointer for the visitors to claim the win.

 

Geddes scored 20 with four boards and a pair of steals, while Nylah Young scored 16 points, and Anahi-Lee Cauley scored 10 with seven rebounds and dealt five assists.

 

Delaware on Sunday visits Monmouth in West Long Branch, N.J., at OceanFirst Bank Center. The game airs at 2 p.m. on FloHoops, SNY, and NBC Philadelphia.

 

In Towson’s win, Kylie Kornegay-Lucas scored inside with 35 seconds left in regulation to tie Stony Brook, who’s Khari Clark missed a layup with seven seconds left to win it.

 

Gigi Gonzalez made a layup with 3:41 left in the first overtime for Stony Brook to snap the tie, but neither team could score until Kornegay-Lucas made a pair of foul shots with 1:59 to tie it for Towson, who then went ahead when Patricia Anumgba made a layup after she stole the ball.

 

Clark then missed a three-pointer and Kornegay-Lucas scored with 56 seconds left and then extended by six points with a pair of foul shots.

 

Towson got several more points from the line and the home team got its only other field goal in the overtime for the game’s final points.

 

Kornegay-Lucas with 25 points and Anumgba with 22 were the only ones in double figures for the winners while Clark had 23 points, Gonzalez 19, and Sherese Pittman 17 for the home team.

 

The National Scene: In the Ivy League, Columbia (16-5, 7-1) at home in New York beat visiting Brown 90-73 to pull within a half-game of first-place No. 25 Princeton, which plays at Penn at 2 p.m. Saturday (ESPN+).

 

The Lions got 23 points from Abbey Hsu with 13 rebounds while Cecilia Collins scored 21 and reserve Nicole Stephens scored 17 and reserve Perri Page had 10 rebounds.

 

Kyla Jones had 27 and Grace Arnolie had 24 for the Bears.

 

Were Penn to upset Princeton besides causing a tie at the top, the Quakers would tie Brown for the fourth playoff spot in next month’s tourney at Columbia.

 

In the Big East Butler upset visiting St. John’s 64-59 enabling for the moment idle Villanova to move into third place. Were the Wildcats to win at Marquette in Milwaukee Saturday at 3 p.m. besides collecting a sweep in the series they could hold the spot.

 

Out West in the Pac-12, sixth-ranked Stanford (21-3, 10-2) avoided an upset after blowing a seven-point lead in regulation to win 63-59 in overtime against Washington (13-9, 3-8) in Seattle and stay tied for first with No. 4 Colorado (20-3, 10-2) which cruised at home in Boulder 90-57 over Oregon (11-13, 2-9).

 

Cameron Brink had seven of her 22 points for Stanford in the extra period as Hall of Fame coach Tara Van DerVeer extended her record collegiate win total to 1207.

 

UConn’s Geno Auriemma reached 1200 earlier in the week but on Sunday his No. 11 Huskies will be at No. 1 South Carolina.

 

Stanford also got 11 points from Courtney Ogden.

 

“We just said that it's our game, we just got to come out there and want it more than they did,” Brink said. “I think they were more aggressive than us at times. So, we just kind of took that on our chin and we were like this game is ours.”

 

Stanford led by 15 in the first half, Washington tied it at 31 in the third, but the Cardinal went up 50-43 with two minutes left in regulation.

 

The home team then went on to erase that deficit, forcing the extra.

 

“To be down seven and come back when they did in the regulation, give them a lot of credit. But Cam was a warrior out there and I thought she did a great job,” vanDerveer said.

 

Brink also grabbed nine rebounds with six blocks.

 

Hannah Stines had 17 points for Washington.

 

“Really proud of our teams fight tonight,” Washington coach Tina Langley said. “I thought we came out and battled and showed a lot of improvement from our last game.”

 

Stanford is at Washington State on Sunday.

 

Colorado had 32 assists in its win, the most since 35 against St. Francis, Pa., in November of 1994.

 

Maddie Nolan had 14 of her game-high 19 points in the second quarter for the Buffaloes.

 

“I just think everyone's just really buying into that idea of just sharing the ball until we find the best team shot that we can get,” Colorado coach JR Payne said. “No one was forcing anything tonight.”

 

Her team will play No. 17 Oregon State on Sunday looking for a split in the season series.

 

The Beavers (19-3, 8-3) Will arrive having won add at No. 20 Utah 58-44 in Salt Lake City Friday night as Reagan Beers scored 17 points.

 

Kennady McQueen had 14 for Utah, whose Alissa Pili was held to 12 points. The Utes will host Oregon, Sunday.

 

No. 10 Southern Cal easily beat visiting Arizona State 81-63 at home in the Galen Center in Los Angeles as freshman sensation JuJu Watkins scored 25 of her 31 points in the second half.

 

It was the third straight win for the Trojans (17-4, 7-4) after losing three of four in the PAC-12.

 

Watkins also had seven boards, five assists, two steals and was 8-9 at the line.

 

Jalyn Brown had 24 points for the Sun Devils (10-3, 2-9) who go to No. 9 UCLA Sunday while USC hosts Arizona, who lost to UCLA 66-58 in Pauley Pavilion.

 

The Bruins (18-4, 7-4) got 21 points and 15 rebounds from reserve Gabriela Jaquez in the win over the Wildcats (12-11, 4-7) while Kiki Rice scored 20 points.

 

Looking Ahead: On Saturday besides games mentioned, Temple, within 1.5 games of first in the wild American Athletic Conference, hosts preseason favorite South Florida at 3 p.m. in the Liacouras Center. 

 

The visiting Bulls (14-10, 6-5) have struggled sitting in a three-way tie for seventh.

 

A win for the Owls (12-10, 6-4) gets them closer to clinching a .500 season record, which would lead to somewhere in the postseason if they don’t win the conference title, an achievement very much possible in a wide-open race with eight teams within two of each other.

 

In other games involving the locals at 2 p.m., Rider hosts Manhattan in the MAAC at Alumni Gym in Larenceville, N.J., (ESPN+); La Salle is at Duquesne in the Atlantic 10 in Pittsburgh (ESPN+); Rutgers is at Michigan in the Big Ten in Ann Arbor (B1G); and Lehigh takes the short trip to play rival Lafayette in the Patriot League at the Kirby Sports Center in Easton (ESPN+).

 

Nationally, in the Big 12 No. 22 West Virginia is at No. 18 Baylor at 3 p.m. (ESPN+) in Waco, Texas.

 

On Sunday, Penn State is at Wisconsin at 2 p.m. in the Big Ten.

 

Nationally, at 1 p.m., No. 2 Iowa at 1 p.m. in the Big Ten on FS1 is at Nebraska, the visiting Hawkeyes’ Caitlin Clark is within 39 points of breaking the NCAA women’s career scoring record.

 

The UConn-South Carolina game is 2 p.m. on ESPN; Richmond a half-game behind idle Saint Joseph’s in the A-10 hosts George Washington at 1 p.m. (ESPN+).

 

And that’s the report.