{"id":4249,"date":"2020-04-04T14:21:30","date_gmt":"2020-04-04T18:21:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sullyonsports.com\/?p=4249"},"modified":"2020-04-04T14:21:30","modified_gmt":"2020-04-04T18:21:30","slug":"womens-basketball-survives-slugfest-with-george-washington","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sullyonsports.com\/?p=4249","title":{"rendered":"Women\u2019s Basketball Survives Slugfest With George Washington"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

This article originally appeared in The Fordham Ram in January 2020.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Entering Sunday\u2019s matchup against George Washington at 1\u20131 in A-10 play, Fordham Women\u2019s Basketball would have taken a victory by any means necessary. In Sunday\u2019s game, the Rams had to survive for a win by almost every necessary means.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fordham defeated GW 53\u201347 in the Bronx in what would best be described as a rock fight between the last two Atlantic 10 champions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI was proud of the kids when it came down to a defensive stop,\u201d Fordham head coach Stephanie Gaitley said. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Rams were up by two with under a minute to go when the visiting Colonials got possession with 33 seconds left. With a chance to tie or take the lead, GW instead turned it over, as a brilliant disguise by the Fordham defense caused a giveaway and a foul near half court. Fordham sophomore Kaitlyn Downey fell on the ball and drew a foul on George Washington freshman Tori Hyduke. After several GW fouls, two clutch free throws each by juniors Kendell Heremaia and Bre Cavanaugh helped ice the game and give Fordham a much-needed win to move to 2\u20131 early in the A-10 season.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI think it\u2019s huge because we haven\u2019t had close games,\u201d Gaitley said. \u201cI mean, we were beaten pretty handily by Davidson, in our Christmas tournament, we weren\u2019t challenged\u2026 it came down to a stop, so you couldn\u2019t have scripted that any better.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Fordham Women\u2019s Basketball program has long been hailed for its defensive prowess, and the Rams needed to lean on that lockdown defense on Sunday. Fordham\u2019s offense struggled to score all day, and the team finished the game shooting just 37% from the field and 8\u201326 from three-point range. That being said, Fordham always feels like it is in the game if it can play quality defense, and this theory was affirmed over 40 minutes on Sunday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Individually, most of the usual suspects led the Fordham attack. Freshman Anna DeWolfe dropped 10 points on 4\u201310 shooting. Cavanaugh had 12 points including a quick eight out of the gates in the first quarter. Heremaia, the A-10\u2019s leading rebounder entering Sunday\u2019s action, affected the game in several different ways, with 12 points, five rebounds and four early steals. Last but not least, Downey played one of her best games as a Ram, scoring 12 points and playing excellent defense down low. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fordham got everything it could handle from a George Washington team that is much improved off of last year\u2019s 10\u201320 showing. Fordham had a 10-point lead at the halftime break, but a cold shooting performance in the second half meant that the Rams needed to lean on their defense and toughness to pull through with a win. In the end, Fordham was able to do just that.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After Sunday\u2019s win, Fordham will have some time off. The team\u2019s next game isn\u2019t until this Sunday at George Mason, with tip-off from Fairfax coming at 4 p.m. The home side will boast the defending Atlantic 10 Player of the Year in junior Nicole Carda\u00f1o-Hillary. The matchup should be an exciting battle between her and two of the A-10\u2019s best players so far this season in Fordham\u2019s Cavanaugh and Heremaia.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This article originally appeared in The Fordham Ram in January 2020. Entering Sunday\u2019s matchup against George Washington at 1\u20131 in A-10 play, Fordham Women\u2019s Basketball would have taken a victory by any means necessary. In Sunday\u2019s game, the Rams had to survive for a win by almost every necessary means. Fordham defeated GW 53\u201347 in … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “Women\u2019s Basketball Survives Slugfest With George Washington”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[681],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4249","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-writing"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sullyonsports.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4249","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sullyonsports.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sullyonsports.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sullyonsports.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sullyonsports.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4249"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/sullyonsports.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4249\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4250,"href":"https:\/\/sullyonsports.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4249\/revisions\/4250"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sullyonsports.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4249"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sullyonsports.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4249"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sullyonsports.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4249"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}