Despite holding a seven-point lead midway through the fourth quarter, Marist women’s basketball unraveled down the stretch, as Quinnipiac pulled out a 64-62 overtime win.
Poor shooting sank Marist when it mattered most, as the team failed to capitalize on numerous opportunities created by junior guard Catie Cunningham’s 17 rebounds. In contrast, freshman center Anna Foley came alive for Quinnipiac at various junctures, leading all scorers with 24 points to go along with 14 rebounds.
There’s no getting around it – this was a crucial game for Marist (5-14, 3-6 MAAC Conference). A win would have put the Red Foxes ahead of Quinnipiac (8-11, 5-5 MAAC) in the MAAC standings and into the thick of the race for a top-six seed. Instead, Marist is now eighth in the conference with just over a third of the season remaining.
“In the locker room, everybody’s down obviously, but the way the conference schedule is set up, we talked about how you have to have a next-play mentality,” said Marist head coach Erin Doughty. “We can think about it tonight, the staff will certainly watch it and review it, but tomorrow it’s gotta be laser-focused on [our next opponent] Siena.”
Each team had to contend with a key absence; for Marist, it was their lead playmaker in senior point guard Kiara Fisher riding the pine after reinjuring herself in the previous loss against Manhattan. Her absence led to shared playmaking duties, with four Red Foxes tallying at least three assists. For Quinnipiac, they were without their lead scorer in junior guard Jackie Grisdale, who has only suited up for eight contests this season.
Marist made a trifecta of three-pointers early in the first quarter courtesy of redshirt sophomore guard Lexie Tarul, sophomore center Morgan Lee and sophomore guard Jackie Piddock. The offense dried up on both ends for the rest of the quarter, although Quinnipiac did use the three-ball to tie things up in the final few minutes when senior guard Jillian Casey drilled one from downtown. At the end of one, the score read 9-9.
The Red Foxes established a bit of a cushion in the second quarter, with Cunningham swishing a rare three to put Marist up by five. After a timeout, Piddock ran up the floor and made a layup to extend the lead, and Lee followed it up with an interior bucket of her own to put Marist up nine. On the other end of the floor, the Marist defense continued to hold up its end of the bargain.
Midway through the second quarter, sophomore guard Morgan Tompkins corralled a dime from senior forward Zaria Shazer and made a hook shot underneath. Freshman Quinnipiac guard Ava Sollene responded with a silky smooth three, and a long two from Foley narrowed the deficit to six. Another pair of smooth midrange makes from Foley cut the Marist lead to three a few minutes before intermission. Foley paced all scorers in the first hald with 10 points on 5-7 shooting, yet Marist took a 29-24 lead into the break.
“I think we were falling for [Foley’s] fakes a little bit, and she shoots that 15-footer elbow jumper really well, so we wanted to stay up on her left shoulder and make her beat us going to the right,” said Doughty. “I thought we took away her ability to be effective from the elbow in the second half.”
Shazer kicked off second-half scoring by flaunting her midrange game, and Lee kept the momentum going, tracking down a loose ball that gave Marist another possession that ended with two Shazer free throws. By this point in the game, it became impossible to ignore the contributions of Cunningham, who could be seen all over the floor doing the dirty work; she had already accumulated 10 rebounds before the end of the third quarter.
At the end of the third quarter, redshirt sophomore guard Lexie Tarul improbably banked in a last-ditch buzzer-beater three-point shot, sending McCann into a frenzy and giving Marist a 45-38 lead with one quarter left to play.
The Bobcats would not go away, making it a five-point game with six minutes remaining; Foley used the threat of her scoring on the interior to set freshman guard Karson Martin up for a wide-open jumper. Marist ran into a clunky stretch offensively, with forced shots deep into the shot clock allowing Quinnipiac to close the gap to 47-44.
Freshman guard Julia Corsentino subbed in with under five to play and finally broke Marist out of their slump with a bucket, but Quinnipiac responded to keep the deficit at three. A Tarul free throw pushed the Marist lead to four, but a Foley steal and a fast break layup from freshman guard Maria Kealy made the score 50-48 with only a minute remaining.
An offensive foul on Shazer gave Quinnipiac the rock with a chance to tie it or take the lead, and it was clear that Marist was reeling. Sure enough, the Bobcats were up to task, as junior forward Grace LaBarge sank a long two-pointer to tie the game at 50. With the Marist lead evaporated into thin air, another fruitless Red Fox possession ensued; even after Cunningham corralled the offensive board on a Corsentino miss, Marist still could not finish off the possession. Luckily for Marist, Quinnipiac could not capitalize on the other end, sending the game to overtime.
Foley asserted herself on the first possession of OT, storming inside and making the layup. Martin pushed the Bobcat lead to four with a long jumper, and Foley kept it there with a jumper of her own. Cunningham kept Marist in the game with a layup and two free throws to bring her team within two, but Quinnipiac kept responding and led 58-54 with 2 minutes left to play.
Tarul showed up in the clutch, making a tough fadeaway shot, but then foul from sophomore forward Ciara Croker on the other end sent Foley to the line, where she swished her 21st and 22nd points of the day. Cunningham laid it all on the line yet again, driving inside, making a hard-fought layup and drawing an emphatic foul that sent McCann ablaze and more importantly, made it a one-point game with a minute left.
“[Cunningham] is playing in discomfort all the time, but she thrives for those roles, the ‘I’ll get a rebound, I’ll get a loose ball’,” said Doughty.
Nevertheless, Quinnipiac held on, as they made their free throws and Marist could not buy a shot inside the final minute save for an essentially meaningless Piddock three while down multiple possessions. When the final buzzer sounded, the Bobcats emerged with a 64-62 victory.
Marist will not have much time to recover from the excruciating loss, as they take to the McCann Arena floor once again Saturday night at 7 p.m. to face off against MAAC foe Siena.
Edited by Ben Leeds
Graphic by Cara Lacey; photo from Marist Athletics
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