Drexel Spoils Shazer’s Historic Night, Women’s Basketball Drops Fifth Straight

Senior forward Zaria Shazer reached 1,000 career points in tonight’s matchup against Drexel, but the Dragons overshadowed her big night, fending off Marist’s dangerous second-half comeback to win 51-36. 

Both the Marist Red Foxes (2-6) and Drexel Dragons (3-3) were battling for their third win of the season at McCann Arena on Wednesday night. After a dominant first half on both ends of the floor, Drexel took an 11-point lead into halftime. Led by Shazer’s 16 points, The Red Foxes stormed back after the break cutting the lead to one. However, senior forward Chloe Hodges’ 18 points including 8 in the fourth quarter ultimately exhausted the Red Foxes. 

Drexel’s lively press defense pressured the Red Foxes early, forcing four straight empty possessions for the Red Foxes to start the game. 

Marist head coach Erin Doughty called her first timeout early, after Drexel’s 6-0 run as three different Dragon starters scored buckets inside the Red Fox paint. 

Following the early timeout, Marist’s drawn-up play failed as junior guard Catie Cunningham’s right-side baseline jumper bounced in and out leading to a quick rebound and transition basket for Drexel, bringing the lead to 8-0. 

Marist finally opened their scoring after a quick catch and shoot at the free throw line from Shazer for her first basket on her historic night. 

Shazer’s slow start vs St Johns proved to be well behind her as she had the hot hand in the first quarter, knocking down back-to-back elbow jumpers. 

Both teams struggled offensively to open the second quarter as multiple possessions were killed by turnovers. Consecutive Red Fox stops could not be capitalized upon as Cuningham missed a wide-open layup from a beautiful feed by Shazer. Shazer missed a layup on the following possession as both teams fell into a three-minute scoring drought. 

Back-to-back and-one calls for senior forward Jasmine Valentine extended the Drexel advantage to 23-12 with four minutes remaining in the half. 

The Dragons held Marist to just four points in the entire second quarter until Catie Cunningham found Shazer in the post, who spun between two Drexel defenders for a left-handed layup for her eighth points of the night. 

Marist then prevented a buzzer-beater attempt by Valentine to close out the first half, trailing 25-14.  

Sophomore center Morgan Lee kicked off the second half with a three-pointer, firing up the home crowd. The momentum was quickly erased as senior forward Chloe Hodges responded with a deep jumper to bring the score to 27-17. 

Shazer came right back with two points of her own as the Red Foxes looked energized from the break. Two defensive stops led to a Jackie Piddock drive and score for her first basket of the game. 

Back-to-back missed Drexel jumpers helped the Red Foxes march down the floor and feed Zaria Shazer, who maneuvered through the Dragon paint for her first points of the second half. The basket put her at 14 points in the game and marked 1,000 points scored in her career, as well as cutting the Dragon halftime double-digit lead to a one-possession game.

“[Zaria] believes in herself tremendously and she’s done so much for this team,” said Doughty, regarding Shazer’s milestone. “I’m really excited for her, she’s just someone who works so hard.” 

Marist cut the lead to just one point after a jumper sank from sophomore forward Ciara Croker. Drexel, with their backs against the wall, showed no fear. They remained in ahead as the 3rd quarter closed when Hodges caught an inbound pass and scored at the buzzer to go up 35-32. 

The start of the fourth quarter halted the Red Fox’s run as Hodges scored another bucket and a jumper from LaClair forced Doughty to take a timeout, down 39-32.  

With 7 minutes left and the shot clock winding down, Hodges sank another deep jumper to extend the lead to 43-35. 

“We started out flat so it took a lot out of us to really fight and get back into the game. By the time the fourth quarter came, we were a little drained,” said Shazer. 

The Marist offense went cold with five minutes remaining and the energized Dragons continued to push the tempo and score, pushing their lead back to double digits.

The Red Foxes struggled to string together an offensive score as the clock quickly approached two minutes remaining. Hodges took over the ball game for the Dragons as her four consecutive points following a key block on defense, deflated an exhausted Marist team, bringing the score to a final of 51-36. 

Drexel’s controlling performance proved to be enough to hand Marist their fifth consecutive loss. The Red Foxes will look to rebound when they travel to the University of Albany for a matchup with the Great Danes on Saturday at 2 p.m.

Edited by Ben Leeds

Graphic and photo by Jaylen Rizzo

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