ST. PAUL, Minn. – The Macalester College women's basketball team dropped a close MIAC game on the road at Saint Mary's University, 56-52 Wednesday night at Saint Mary's Gym. The loss gives the Scots a 7-5 record on the season, including a 1-4 mark in the conference. The Cardinals improve to 9-3, 3-2 MIAC.
In a tight contest from start to finish, Saint Mary's tallied the final seven points in the first half to take the game's largest lead to that point, 25-19 at the half. Macalester held the Cardinals to just 31.0 percent shooting from the field, but the hosts made four threes compared to none for the Scots in the game's first 20 minutes.
Saint Mary's pushed its lead to eight, 32-24 with 6:16 to play in the third quarter. Three-pointers by senior guard
Lauren Clamage (Lake Forest, Ill./Lake Forest Acad.) and junior guard
Vivi Gregorich (Boulder, Colo./Boulder) sparked a 12-6 Macalester run that made it a two-point game, 38-36 with 2:13 on the clock. Early in the fourth quarter, another three and a basket by Clamage gave the Scots a 49-47 edge with 7:36 left in the game.
Following a free throw and a layup by Brandi Blattner that put the Cardinals up 50-49, senior forward
Park Masterson (Poway, Calif./Poway) made a free throw to tie the score at 50-50 with 4:50 remaining. Saint Mary's answered with a three-pointer from Kirsten Keefe and another Blattner layup for a 55-50 advantage with three minutes to play. After three empty possessions by both teams, Clamage hit two free throws with 53 seconds left to make the score 55-52. But the Scots failed to score on its final two possessions, and the Cardinals wrapped up the win with a late free throw.
Clamage finished with a game-high 22 points while making 3-of-7 from three-point range. Gregorich and Masterson each scored nine points, with Masterson grabbing eight rebounds and Gregorich adding five boards and four assists. Junior center
Regan Fruh (Helena, Mont./Helena) also had eight rebounds to go with four steals. For Saint Mary's, Emma Schaefer had 10 points, five assists and five steals, while Blattner snared 16 boards to help the Cardinals outrebound the Scots, 44-31.
Next up for the Scots is another MIAC game on Saturday, Jan. 7 at St. Olaf, beginning at 1:00 p.m. in Northfield, Minn.
