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YSU women lose on buzzer-beating 3-pointer
Cash scores 25, but Penguins fall
By CHARLES GROVE
highland heights, Ky.
BB&T Arena wasn’t a friendly place to the Penguins this week.
A night after the Youngstown State men’s basketball team dropped a 76-69 decision to Northern Kentucky on Thursday night, the YSU women were beaten 24 hours later, 65-62.
Junior guard Molly Glick hit a buzzer-beating 3-pointer to defeat YSU, which clawed back from 13 points down late in the third quarter.
“We’ve come back from deficits before so we felt pretty confident we could come back so it was really tough to see that shot go in,” YSU senior Melinda Trimmer said.
On a night when YSU struggled to find a rhythm offensively, senior Sarah Cash was the highlight. She led all scorers with 25 points and added seven rebounds. Trimmer added 12 points in the loss.
Glick scored 16 points while Taylor Clos and Ally Niece each scored 14 for the Norse (8-17, 7-8 Horizon League).
After Cash tied the game at 62 on a layup with 40 seconds to go, NKU got three opportunities during the final moments as the Penguins gave up an offensive rebound and then knocked the ball out of bounds after another missed shot, which ultimately set up Glick’s 3-pointer.
“If we box out and find a way to get the ball we’re the ones who have the shot at the end,” YSU head coach John Barnes said. “Mental stuff all game cost us the game. Not anything else.”
YSU (20-7, 12-4 Horizon League) played much of the game without leading scorer Mary Dunn, who was saddled with foul trouble. The junior managed four points and one rebound in 11 minutes.
“That changed the game a lot because then they played four guards,” NKU head coach Camryn Whitaker said. “It hurt [YSU] because when you have Cash and Dunn in there together there’s so much focus on trying to take away them it opens everything up for them to get cleaner looks from 3.”
In the first three quarters, YSU was a mere 2 of 19 from three before hitting 4 of 9 in the final quarter. Alison Smolinski broke the school’s season record for made 3s, but it came on a poor shooting night as she shot 1 of 11.
“We’re not winning any games when we shoot like that,” Barnes said.
Despite the foul trouble combined with poor shooting, YSU trailed by only one at halftime. Hopes of a solid start to the second half were quickly dashed when Clos hit back-to-back 3-pointers.
“We came out of the half in the locker room saying we can’t let [Clos] shoot and she hits two 3s like that,” Barnes said.
Said Trimmer: “It was a dagger. I thought we were going to have some momentum coming out of the locker room.”
It was the start of a great half for the Norse that saw them shoot 8 of 12 in the third quarter, including all five of their 3s. The Penguins managed just five field goals in the same quarter.
YSU battled back and tied things up on three separate occasions in the fourth quarter, but could never take the lead. The Penguins took advantage of four NKU turnovers down the stretch, holding a 10-2 lead in points off turnovers but the team couldn’t get the final stop they needed to force overtime.
With NKU getting the ball underneath their attacking basket with one second remaining, Barnes’ strategy was to keep the Norse from getting a look close to the rim. Instead Glick got a look from well beyond the 3-point arc, but she shot with confidence.
“I knew it,” Glick said. “I knew it as soon as I shot it and I was like ‘That’s in! That’s in!’”
No matter where Glick got the look, Whitaker said she just wanted to get the ball into Glick’s hands.
“She’s technically a senior as a redshirt junior and she’s worked really hard for the right to shoot that shot,” Whitaker said. “We were just trying to get her the ball. We hadn’t even practiced that play. We drew it up right in the timeout.”
On this road trip, this was supposed to be the easier of the two games for the Penguins who now travel an hour north to play Wright State (21-6, 13-2 Horizon League). The Raiders blew out Cleveland State 78-52 Friday night.
“We’ve got to bring it all during practice [today],” Trimmer said. “We’ve got to readjust our focus because there’s till two games left in the season that we’ve got to win.”