HICKORY, N.C. – Despite outscoring the seventh-ranked Lenoir-Rhyne Bears in the second half of Wednesday night’s game, the Newberry College women’s basketball team (5-6, 1-2 South Atlantic Conference) dropped the midweek contest to the undefeated Bears 68-57.
Redshirt senior center Ericka Wiseley (Mt. Pleasant) found herself in a familiar position as the Wolves’ top scorer with 12 points. She also recorded eight rebounds and two assists in the loss. Tyla Paraha (Melbourne, Victoria, Australia) also recorded double-digit points, 10, to go along with her two rebounds and one assist. The Wolves’ centers, Wiseley, sophomore April Rummery-Lamb (Darwin, NT, Australia), and redshirt senior Tyla Stolberg (Brisbane, Queensland, Australia), combined for 28 for the team’s 57 points.
Over the first five minutes of the first quarter, the Wolves struggled to get shots to sink. After Wiseley recorded the Wolves’ first points after a minute and forty-five seconds into the game to tie the game at two points each, the Wolves missed three consecutive shots and recorded two turnovers before Rummery-Lamb ended the Bears’ two-and-a-half minute 8-0 run. A minute later, Rummery-Lamb scored the Wolves’ next point when she converted the back half of a pair of free throws. Over the next minute, the Wolves forced two missed shots from the Bears and senior guard Giulia Bongiorno (Rome, Italy) sank a two-point shot to cut the lead to seven points, 14-7. The final three minutes of the first quarter saw just six points and the Bears ended the opening quarter on a 4-2 run, giving them a 18-9 advantage going into the second quarter.
After 43 seconds and three Lenoir-Rhyne points, senior guard Holly Davies (Camberley, Surrey, England) scored her first three points of the game as she sank a shot from beyond the arc, keeping the lead at nine points. Almost two minutes and two missed shots from the Bears later, Lenoir-Rhyne got the scoring going again with a layup. With seven-and-a-half minutes left in the first half, Stolberg immediately answered back with a layup of her own and the Bears’ lead again stood at nine points. Over the next three minutes, the Wolves’ defense forced four missed shots from the Bears, including two from beyond the arc, before a foul sent Lenoir-Rhyne to the free throw line for two shots that were both made. An and-one that the Bears converted grew their lead to 14 points with just over four minutes remaining in the first half. Over the final 3:14 of the half, the Wolves outpaced the Bears 5-4 with all five of the Wolves’ points coming from Stolberg. The Wolves entered the locker room down 13 points, 32-19.
Over the first two minutes of the second half, junior guards Payton Cronen (Louisville, Ky.) and Faith Putz (Des Moines, Iowa) both recorded three-point shots to cut the lead to ten points. The Wolves proceeded to force two missed shots before the Bears regained composure and one scorer put up five straight points. In total, the Wolves’ scoring drought reached three minutes and forty-five seconds before Wiseley netted a layup to bring the score to 44-27. Fifty-four seconds later, Wiseley scored the game’s next points on another layup. Over the final 3:20, of the third quarter, Lenoir-Rhyne outpaced the Wolves 9-6 with two-point Newberry baskets coming from Paraha, Wiseley, and Bongiorno. The Wolves forced two missed shots and a turnover from the Bears in the final minute-and-a-half of the third quarter as the Wolves entered the final quarter down 53-35.
The Wolves outscored the Bears by seven points in the fourth quarter. They opened the quarter on a 8-2 run that lasted just over three minutes, cutting the lead to 12 points. Over the next two minutes. the Wolves cut the lead to just 10 points, 57-47, with just over five minutes to play. With just over four-and-a-half minutes to play, Davies sank a jump shot to cut the lead to single digits for the first time since the second quarter. But following Davies’ basket, the Wolves and Bears went almost basket-for-basket and the Bears ended the game on a 10-8 run and the Wolves fell 68-57.