Boxscore
New York ? The Ivy League Champion Dartmouth
women's basketball team had its thrilling late-season run stopped by Cornell in
the final game of the Ivy Playoff today.
Cornell (20-8) led from beginning to end in a 64-47 victory
to snap Dartmouth's
(15-15) seven-game winning streak and earn the Ivy's automatic bid to the NCAA
Tournament. Dartmouth's
season will continue, however, as it has earned an automatic bid to the WNIT.
This year's Ivy Playoff was the fifth in the history of the
conference, with Dartmouth
involved in all five. The Big Green is 5-2 all-time in playoff games, including
a win on Friday over Harvard. Cornell had received a bye to today's game after
winning a coin pull.
Cornell had four players in double-figures including three
frontcourt players combining for 39 points while Dartmouth's offense struggled all afternoon.
Senior guard Kristen Craft (Marshalltown, Iowa) led the Big Green with 13 points and four assists
while rookie Brittney Smith (Fort
Worth, Texas) tallied
12 points.
The Big Red opened the game on a 9-0 run, forcing Dartmouth coach Chris
Wielgus to call timeout to regroup her squad. Cornell scored again before Smith
hit Dartmouth's
first shot of the game to make it 11-2, Big Red at 14:32. Cornell continued to
extend its lead, going on an 8-2 run to take a 19-4 lead at 10:54 off a Jeomi
Maduka jumpshot.
Dartmouth
just could not put the ball in the basket and Cornell's lead swelled to 17 points,
up 28-11 at 3:10 before the Big Green managed an 8-4 run to close the half down
32-19.
In the second, Cornell scored its first four points from the
free-throw line as the Big Green was whistled for four quick fouls in the first
three minutes. Junior Darcy Rose (Fort
Collins, Colo.)
scored at 16:37 to make it 36-21, Cornell. A three-pointer by Allie Fedorowicz
at 12:11 gave the Big Red its largest lead of the night, up 47-24 at 12:11.
The Big Green tried to get back into it, but Cornell had an
answer for every Big Green bucket. Craft did a nice job getting herself to the
rim late as did Smith, but a lack of production from beyond the arc kept Dartmouth from really cutting into the Big
Red lead.
Koren Schram (Batesville, Ark.), Dartmouth's
leading scorer, was held to just five points but her stifling on ball defense gave
Cornell point guard Lauren Benson fits all night. Senior forward Sydney Scott (Houston, Texas)
played in her 115th career game and hauled in a game-high nine
rebounds.
Dartmouth
hit just 28.8 percent of its shots for the game while Cornell was 44.2 percent
from the floor.
The Big Green will learn its postseason fate on Monday
night. WNIT games are played at home sites and first round play starts this
Wednesday and Thursday.
