By Taylor Nigrelli
ST. BONAVENTURE, N.Y. — To say things looked bleak for the St. Bonaventure women’s basketball team early in the second half Saturday would be quite the understatement.
The Bonnies (20-7, 9-3) trailed the Duquesne Dukes (16-9, 8-4) by 22 points, 47-25 just four minutes into the second half of a conference game at the Reilly Center.
Just under 15 minutes of game time later, the Bonnies took a 63-62 lead on a layup by sophomore forward Katie Healy. The score held for the final 70 seconds of the game as the Bonnies earned their 20th win of the season.
“There’s a lot I could go into right now but it’s pretty clear this group has a lot of resolve,” St. Bonaventure Head Coach Jim Crowley said. “We didn’t really play well – and that’s an understatement – for the first 25, 26 minutes.”
After falling behind by 22 early in the second half, the Bonnies outscored the Dukes 38-15 over the final 15:54. Over the final 5:34 of the game, the Bonnies held a 14-2 advantage, including holding Duquesne scoreless over the final 3:42. Crowley credited the comeback to a strong defensive effort by his team in the second half.
“I thought over the last 12-15 minutes, our defense was outstanding,” Crowley said. “We made them really work hard and we did a very good job of getting stops and converting. I don’t think anyone doubted that we could do it, we were just having trouble correcting things.”
The Bonnies struggled to stop the Dukes in the first half and early goings of the second half. Duquesne shot 13-25 in the first half, including 4-8 from beyond the arch. The Dukes scored 47 points in the game’s first 23 minutes. Things changed in the game’s final 15 minutes, however, as the Bonnies held Duquesne to just 9-27 shooting, including just three field goals in the game’s final 12 minutes.
Crowley said he wasn’t so much focused on the scoreboard early but rather on how his team was playing. He was disappointed in the play at first, but noticed a tangible difference late in the game.
“I try not to focus on the score at times and I try to focus on how we’re playing,” Crowley said. “And we just weren’t playing very well. We weren’t playing hard, we weren’t playing together. I think the kids decided at that point ‘let’s do what we’ve done all year and see where it takes us. Let’s just play hard and not worry about the scoreboard.’”
The Bonnies also struggled with turnovers early in the game. Duquesne’s zone defense used a multitude of different looks and a heavy dose of double-teaming to force the Bonnies into mistakes. Early on, this worked perfectly for the Dukes.
The Bonnies shot just 7-20 in the first half with 12 turnovers and zero assists. At one point early in the second half, the team had 25 points and 15 turnovers. In the game’s final 16 minutes, the Bonnies scored 38 points while only turning the ball over twice.
Like nearly every other positive aspect of the game, Crowley credited this success to his defense getting stops.
“I think stops helped,” Crowley said. “I know I keep going back to that but when we get stops, they can’t press, we get a lot better rhythm going and I think our kids stop thinking of missing shots and they just kind of start going with better pace and tempo.”
Healy, who grabbed the game-winning rebound in the waning seconds of Duquesne’s final possession, nearly hit her career high in points Saturday afternoon. She finished with 26, eight of which came from the foul line.
Healy was hit with a technical foul early in the second half, sat for a few minutes and then re-entered to provide a spark for the team’s comeback.
“I knew I had to be smart,” Healy said. “What I was doing wasn’t smart so I got a little bit of rest, calmed myself down and came back in the late part of the second half to just do what we do.”
Aside from Healy, the bulk of St. Bonaventure’s scoring came from sophomore forward Hannah Little who added 15 points. Sophomore guard Nyla Rueter added nine points, all in the second half. Sophomore point guard Emily Michael chose to distribute instead of shoot, as per usual, but the one shot she chose to take was a three-pointer mid-way through the second half that seemed to spark the St. Bonaventure comeback.
Saturday’s game broke a tie between Duquesne and St. Bonaventure for second place in the Atlantic 10. The Bona victory dropped the Dukes all the way down to sixth place in the conference.
The Bonnies will take the court again Wednesday night at seven when they hit the road to take on the VCU Rams.
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