Box Score WALTHAM, Mass. – Graduate forward
Maggie Whitmore (South Portland, Maine/South Portland HS) scored a season-high 24 points and also gave her team five rebounds, three assists, two steals and a block as the Bentley University women's basketball team began its bid for a Northeast-10 Conference four-peat with a 64-50 quarterfinal win over Southern New Hampshire Sunday afternoon on Barbara Stevens Court.
Bentley, the third-ranked team in the WBCA Division II coaches poll, never trailed on route to its 24
th consecutive victory this season and its 12
th straight in Northeast-10 championship play. The top-seeded Falcons improved to 28-1 overall and the ninth-seeded Penmen finished their season at 12-16.
A pair of 11-0 runs helped coach
C White's go into the halftime break up 14, 36-22.
Whitmore was the Falcons' top scorer in the half with 14, and Bentley outscored the Penmen 14-2 off turnovers in the opening two quarters.
The first 11-0 burst came after Southern New Hampshire evened the game at 10-10 and encompassed a span of 4:24 around the quarter break. Two free throws by sophomore guard
Niya Morgen (Swampscott/St. Mary's HS) and a second chance basket by senior forward
Kylie DuCharme (Wilmington/Wilmington HS) put the Falcons up 14-10 after the first stanza.
Scoring in the second began with four points by Whitmore and a traditional three-point play by Morgen. That made it 21-10 a little more than two minutes into the second.
After SNHU drew within six, Bentley put together another 11-0 surge to go up 36-19 with 1:05 left until the halftime break. Whitmore scored on a lay-up, DuCharme had a second-chance basket, junior guard
Cassidy Yeomans (Marion/Tabor Academy) hit a three from the left side, junior post
Ciara Norman (Roebling, N.J./Life Center Academy) made one of two free throws and Morgen stuck a three.
With the Falcons up ten after three, 45-35, Whitmore scored the first six points of the fourth. She hit a straight-ahead three and followed with a three-point play about 30 seconds later to make it 51-35.
A three-minute run of six straight sealed the win, making it a 62-45 game with 1:31 remaining. Whitmore hit a step-back jumper, DuCharme scored on a hook shot and Morgen hit two from the line.
Whitmore, who made 10 of her 13 attempts from inside the line, was followed in the scoring column by DuCharme, who finished with 13 points, seven rebounds and three assists.
Yeomans finished with ten points and three steals, and Morgen matched her in the scoring column.
Southern New Hampshire was led by sophomore forward Amy Winterburn (New Boston, N.H.), who equaled her career-high with 17 points.
Bentley had a tough shooting day (.348 overall and an uncharacteristic 6 of 31 from three) but attempted 16 more shots than the Penmen and had a 12-2 advantage in free throws made.
The Falcons scored 21 points off 25 Penmen turnovers and finished with 19 assists and only 12 turns.
The championships will continue Thursday with the Falcons hosting Southern Connecticut in the semis at 6 pm. The fourth-seeded Owls advanced with a 68-61 win over Pace.
During the regular season, Bentley defeated Southern Connecticut twice, 78-59 and 75-54.
