Box Score NEW LONDON, Conn. - Senior Torie Sutherland scored her 1,000th point as the Bears topped the Pride 70-51 in New England Women's and Men's Athletic Conference (NEWMAC) action.
With the win Coast Guard improves to 5-1 in the conference and 8-5 overall while Springfield drops to 4-2 in the NEWMAC and 9-5 overall.
Sutherland becomes the ninth player in program history to score 1000 points as she now sits at ninth all time. She finished the game with 13 points and seven rebounds.
"It was awesome to see Torie score her 1,000th point tonight," said Coast Guard head coach Alex Ivansheck. "She had very good crowd here to support her and I'm glad that she did it tonight with them in attendance."
Senior Meghan Fornaro had a game high 17 points, eight rebounds, four assists, and three steals. Sophomore Gill Gerton had 14 points and seven rebounds while classmate Michelle Hernandez was 3-5 from beyond the arc with 11 points.
"Michelle is a very consistent shooter, but she really concentrates on defense when she comes in the game, so the offense takes a back seat, but tonight she was catching in rhythm, had great footwork and was exactly what we see in practice," said Ivansheck.
Senior Heather Lewis had a team high eight points for the Pride while junior Lexi Widwer and sophomore Heather King each had seven point and six rebounds respectively.
It was a back and forth game in the first quarter as Coast Guard jumped out to a 9-3 lead after Sutherland finished off the back end of a three point play at the 5:20 mark.
Springfield tied the game at nine with 3:47 left in the first quarter as Lewis found freshman Chelsea McAllister for the layup.
The Bears took a six point lead once again but the Pride would tie the game for the final time in the game at 15 on a King jumper with just over a minute to go in the period. The quarter finished with Coast Guard holding a 19-15 advantage.
The second quarter was a low scoring affair as the Bears outscored the Pride 10-9 giving Coast Guard a 29-24 lead going into the second half.
The Bears took over the game in the third quarter going on a 21-8 run. Hernandez hit two three pointers while Gerton added six points to make the score 50-32 going into the final stanza.
The Bears kept their lead at double digits through the final quarter pushing it to twenty twice capping off Coast Guard's largest win against the Pride at 70-51.
"We were able to change our defenses a lot and I think that really threw off the rhythm of the game," said Ivansheck. "Offensively we really took care of the ball, had a positive assist to turnover ratio and that was our goal for this game. We were very gritty and we missed several layups, but we showed great resilience tonight."
The Bears shot 39.9% (28-72) from the floor and 5-17 (29.4%) from beyond the arc. The Coast Guard held every Springfield player in single digits and turned 22 Springfield turnovers into 27 points.
Springfield was 19-56 (33.9%) overall and 3-20 (15%) from three. The Pride received 20 points from their bench but could not overcome 22 turnovers.
The Bears return to action on Saturday, January 16th when they host first place WPI who is unbeaten in the Conference. Tip off is 7:00 pm.
