BENNINGTON, Vt. — The Southern Vermont College women's basketball team continued its success in New England Collegiate Conference (NECC) action Thursday night, defeating Daniel Webster College 89-74 at the Mountaineer Athletic Center.
The win brings SVC's league mark to 6-0, tying the program's record for the most wins in the NECC since the conference's inception in 2008; the 2011-12 Mountaineers finished 6-12 against the NECC. Southern Vermont is now 8-5 overall, giving the team its most wins since the 1998-99 squad which was 10-13 at the end of the season. Daniel Webster drops to 1-11 on the year, 1-4 in conference play.
SVC junior captain Amber Flagg (Windsor, Connecticut) narrowly missed out on the triple-double, tallying game-highs of 24 points and 11 assists to go with eight rebounds. Classmate Turquoia Johnson (Montgomery Village, Maryland) followed with 14 points and eight boards while fellow junior Sarah McDonald (Cohoes, New York) added 11 points and five rebounds. Junior Kala MacKenzie (Fair Haven, Vermont), sophomore captain Amber Dow (Panton, Vermont), and freshman Danielle Simmons (Rensselaer, New York) all chipped in with 10 points with MacKenzie and Simmons each grabbing eight caroms.
Daniel Webster saw junior captain Ashley England (Old Town, Maine) and sophomore Kayla Free (Quincy, Massachusetts) each register a team-high 21 points with junior captain Natalie Nagle (Dolgeville, New York) scoring eight points to go with her team-best eight rebounds.
The Mountaineers shot at an even 45 percent from the floor (36-80) while DWC was right behind at 40.6 percent (28-69). The Eagles saw success from the outside, going 9-16 from three-point distance (56.2 percent), and the Mountaineers finished with a 5-12 clip (41.7 percent) on deep attempts. The Southern Vermont interior was too much for Daniel Webster to handle as the Mountaineers outscored DWC 54-26 on points in the paint and owned a 58-33 advantage on the boards. SVC's 24 offensive rebounds led to a 23-11 edge in second-chance points for the night.
The score was tight after the opening tip as a MacKenzie put-back after an SVC miss put her team up 12-11 with 14:42 to go in the first. A three-ball from the top of the perimeter by Free gave the Eagles a 19-16 lead shortly after, but the Mountaineers then tallied nine unanswered points to regain the lead; during that stretch, Flagg swiped the ball and sent it down the floor to a breaking Johnson for the lay-in, and Flagg then knocked down a three-pointer to give her team a 25-19 advantage.
SVC kept up the efficiency, first with Dow making a nice pass down low to Johnson who laid it in for a pair. With under six minutes to go, MacKenzie came up with a huge block, got the rebound and sent it down to a breaking Flagg who made the easy bucket to make it a 33-22 ballgame. Daniel Webster showed signs of getting back in the game, notably when freshman Escarlin Reynoso (Lawrence, Massachusetts) drove right down the lane for a layup at the 2:04 mark of the first.
The Eagles then scored the last four points of the half, cutting their deficit to 39-33 heading into the break; Free took an inbound pass from freshman Nicole Beard (Shelton, Connecticut) and hit the jumper with 24 seconds on the clock, and an England steal gave way for her to feed the ball down to freshman Amanda Dargie (Melbourne, Florida) who made the layup with time running low.
Coming out of the intermission, Southern Vermont scored the first eight points of the second half to go up 47-33; the last of those came when Flagg drove to the hoop, getting the layup to go while drawing the foul. She would convert the free throw as the Mountaineers took a comfortable lead they would not give up the rest of the way. Daniel Webster cut it to a nine-point game on threes by Free and sophomore McKenzie Stone (Shelton, Connecticut), but SVC responded with an 11-0 run, during which Flagg had five points, to once again give the hosts a cushion they would carry to the 89-74 win.
Both teams are back in action on Saturday as the Mountaineers visit Wheelock College for a 1 p.m. tip and Daniel Webster hosts Newbury College for a 12 p.m. start.