(Box Score) Goshen, IN — A solid start turned into a salty finish for the Goshen College women’s basketball team Tuesday night at the Roman Gingerich Center, as the Leafs dropped a 74-44 decision to perennial power Cornerstone University.
Goshen (3-3, 0-0) looked to give the Golden Eagles all they could handle early on, maintaining a three-point lead up to the 9:28 mark of the first half.
A 19 to six Cornerstone run effectively changed the landscape of the contest, however, putting the visitors up by a 32-22 score with just under two and a half minutes to play in the first half.
Goshen would get no closer than seven points for the remainder of the game — and no closer than 11 points in the second half — en route to its first home and most lopsided loss of the season.
“Cornerstone is consistently a top 20 team and has gone to the national tournament four years in a row,” said Steve Wiktorowski, Goshen head coach. “We were looking forward to playing them because they are the type of team we want to play to get ready for our very difficult conference schedule. I thought we were ready and played them pretty evenly until about the last two or three minutes of the first half when they went on a little run to get a 10-point lead at halftime.”
Wiktorowksi’s team opened the game with a surge, as sophomores Ashley and Kimmie Hummer each buried three pointers to help the Leafs to an 8-2 advantage just three minutes into play. An interior jumper from freshman Cassie Greives made the score 16-13, Goshen, with 9:28 remaining in the first half, but it was at that point that Cornerstone began to run away with things. The Leafs missed six of their next eight shots from the floor during the Golden Eagles’ aforementioned 19 to six run, falling behind by a 32-22 score at the 2:25 marker.
A three-point play from Greives cut the lead to seven points with one minute remaining before the intermission, but a long ball from Cornerstone’s Krista Vink rebuilt a 35-25 advantage at the half.
“At the break we talked about trying to take away their shots in the lane and their rebounding advantage,” Wiktorowski said. “I thought we did a pretty good job of that to start the second half, but gave up several easy baskets with our press and they hit some shots from the outside to really start to separate from us.”
Cornerstone possessed a 16-point lead (43-27) just three minutes into the second half and led by 22 points (57-35) with 10:59 to play, while Goshen would get no closer than 21 points for the remainder of the contest. The Leafs scored just five points over the final 7:03 of the contest, allowing Cornerstone to continually add to its lead: The final 30-point margin was the largest lead of the game for the Golden Eagles.
“I thought we got some good looks at the basket the second half ourselves but just really struggled to get anything to fall consistently and pretty much didn't score a basket the last five minutes or so of the game,” Wiktorowski said. “I thought they both played and shot very well, while we played just okay and shot poorly overall. Still, playing strong teams like that will contribute a lot to the development of our young team down the line. We are .500 going into Thanksgiving which is a definite improvement over the last two years, and the team is still very optimistic despite last night's struggles.”
Goshen shot just 27.9 percent from the field on the night (17 of 61), equating to the fewest number of made baskets and lowest field goal percentage of the season for the young squad. Cornerstone, meanwhile, connected on 28 of 59 total shots (47.5 percent), the second highest totals for a Leafs’ opponent on the year.
Kimmie Hummer led Goshen’s scoring efforts, charting 10 points on a three of six performance from beyond the arc. Senior Katie Sowers scored eight points and collected six rebounds, while Greives finished with nine and six. Freshman Sierra Buse grabbed a team-high eight rebounds, while Sowers dished out a team-best four assists.
“I thought our guards did a pretty decent job in having 17 turnovers against a pretty physical and aggressive guard group for Cornerstone, especially (junior) Krystal Duensing not having any,” Wiktorowski said. “While we didn't shoot well as a group, it was good to see Kimmie Hummer go three of six from the arc. Our rebounding improved throughout the course of the game and I was especially happy to see Sierra Buse come in and get eight boards off the bench. One area that we need to improve on after the break is getting more points off free throws as we only scored four points from there. I also thought that (freshman) Erica Emanuel, (freshman) Leah Lehman and (freshman) Jessica Carney came in off the bench and competed with a lot of strength and energy tonight when they got the chance.”
Goshen will take a week layoff to enjoy the Thanksgiving holiday before returning to action next week, when the Leafs will travel to Taylor University-Fort Wayne on Wednesday, Nov. 28. Game time is set for 7 p.m. in Fort Wayne.
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Sophomore Kimmie Hummer