The December 17 win over Winthrop was last year, technically. Even though it was just over two weeks ago, it seems like an eternity passed for Fordham, as they shot nearly 57% and had three players reach double figures in scoring against the Eagles, meanwhile, versus Cornell on Monday, the Rams shooting went cold as they lost to the Big Red, 40-39. As a team, the Rams shot just 12.5% from behind the three-point line, they failed to make any foul shots (0-of-7) and saw Charlotte Stoddart be the lone scorer to reach double figures. With the loss, Fordham is now 8-6 on the season, while Cornell improves to 4-7.
The game started off promising for Fordham as they jumped out to a 6-3 lead over the first 2:07 of play with baskets coming from Arielle Collins, Abigail Corning and Stoddart. Cornell tied the game at 6-6, on a Maka Anyanwu free throw at 16:51.
From there, Fordham used the next 3:52 of game time to build a 15-10 lead, the largest of the half for the Rams. Once again, the Big Red fought back to tie the score at 19-19, when Clare Fitzpatrick scored on a layup at 9:02. Fitzpatrick finished with a double-double of 11 points and 15 rebounds.
The third tie of the game came at 7:52, when Marissa Rakestraw nailed a jumper to even the score at 21-all. Just over a minute later, at 6:45, the final field goal of the half from either side came when Taylor Flynn made a jumper. Both teams went on scoring droughts for the remainder of the half and the Big Red took a 23-21 lead into the break.
The Rams grabbed the lead early in the second half as Becky Peters buried a three-pointer at the 18:29 mark to give Fordham the 24-23 advantage. They would push the lead to five at the 16:46 mark on a layup from Christina Gaskin and a jumper from Peters. Cornell scored the next four points to draw within one, 28-27, but Fordham extended the lead from there.
At the 12:30 mark, Stoddart made back to back hoops for the Rams to give them their largest lead of the game, six points, starting with a layup and following that with a three-pointer. The Stoddart trifecta would be the last basket for the Rams until an Arielle Collins drive and layup at 4:57, a scoring drought of 6:53.
Cornell tied the game for the fourth time at 7:56, when Fitzpatrick made a jumper to even the score 33-33. Nearly a minute later, the Big Red took the lead on an Allyson DiMagno layup. They pushed the advantage to five points, 38-33, on an Anyanwu layup at 5:55.
Fordham used the next three minutes to erase the lead as Collins and Gaskin each made baskets to bring the Rams within one, and then Collins gave the Rams a 39-38 lead with a layup at 2:53.
From there, neither team would a bucket until the closing seconds of the contest. Ahead by one with 0:20 remaining, Fordham missed the front end of a one-in-one on two consecutive trips and Cornell grabbed the rebound and used its final timeout.
Out of the final timeout with 10 seconds left, Allyson DiMagno drove through the paint to her left and hit the shot jumper to give the Big Red a 40-39 lead with 0:03 remaining. Arielle Collins’ desperation toss at the end of the game was off the mark and the Big Red won 40-39.
Stoddart led the Rams with 11 points on 5-of-8 shooting. Gaskin shot 4-for-8 and blocked three shots. The Rams outscored the Big Red 15-8 off of turnovers. Fordham closed out its’ four game home stand with a 2-2 record.
The team now heads on the read for three games beginning with a matchup against Delaware State on Wednesday in Dover, Delaware at 6:00 PM.
Game Notes: Becky Peters started her 92nd career game, tying her with Anne Zopf for seventh place on the list…She also logged 36 minutes, giving her 3,196 and moving her past Kathryn McCabe for sixth place…As a team, Fordham pulled down 17 offensive rebounds and outrebounded their opponent for the ninth time this season…The consecutive, one-point losses mark the first time Fordham lost back to back games by one point since they dropped a pair to Boston College, 34-33, and to Manhattanville, 37-36, during the 1971-72 season.
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