The Gustavus Adolphus women’s basketball team saw its 2014-15 season come to an end in the opening round of the MIAC Playoffs with a 90-58 loss to a hot-shooting Saint Mary’s team on Tuesday night at the SMU Gym. The Cardinals jumped out to a 48-30 halftime lead and didn’t look back from there, shooting over 60-percent from the field in both the first and second half. Gustavus finishes the season with an overall record of 17-9, while Saint Mary’s improves to 18-8 and will now travel to Bethel University for an MIAC Playoff Semifinal game against the Royals on Thursday night.
“You have to give Saint Mary’s a lot of credit, they did exactly to us tonight what we did to them on our court a couple a weeks ago,” said head coach Laurie Kelly. “They got a lead early, played with a lot of energy, and continued to stay hot for the duration of the game. The hope at halftime was that we could slow the game down and that they wouldn’t continue to shoot that well, but that didn’t happen – they continued to surge ahead. We never found our rhythm on either ends of the court, and when you run into a team that plays that well in all facets of the game, it’s tough to knock them off.”
Saint Mary’s bolted out of the gate and jumped out to a 10-5 lead within the first three minutes. The Cardinals continued to knocked down shots and pushed their lead to 19-6. With 11:43 remaining in the first half, Saint Mary’s was 10-for-11 from the field and 4-for-4 from three-point range.
The Gusties found their runs stifled by Saint Mary’s continued hot shooting and trailed 35-19 with 6:50 on the clock. Although the Cardinals began to cool down over the final stages of the half, Gustavus could cut the lead to just 12 points (42-30) before Saint Mary’s scored six unanswered points to go up 48-30 at the break.
Saint Mary’s outshot Gustavus 60.9-to-34.5-percent from the field in the opening half. The Cardinals were 6-for-8 from three-point range and cashed in at the free throw line with a 14-for-16 half.
Mikayla Miller (Fy., Goodhue, Minn.) led Gustavus in the opening 20 minutes with 12 points on 5-of-13 shooting. Emma Schaefer went 4-for-5 from the floor and knocked down both her three-point tries to pace Saint Mary’s with 12 points of her own.
Much like the first half, Saint Mary’s got off to a fast start and continued to stay hot from both the field and free throw line in the second half. By the 16:28 mark, the Cardinals had built a 24-point lead up 58-36. Gustavus cut the margin to 19 (64-45) on a three-pointer by Miller at 13:19, yet would come no closer for the remainder of the game. Saint Mary’s responded to Miller’s three with a six point run that Gustavus couldn’t recover from.
With 14 second half points on 6-of-7 shooting (2-3 3PT), Emma Schaefer finished with a game-high 26 points. The Cardinals shot 60-percent from the floor in the second half to end up with a red-hot 60.4-percent (29-48) shooting clip by the final buzzer. Saint Mary’s also finished 9-fo-12 from three-point range and 23-for-26 at the line.
Gustavus finished 19-for-51 (37.3%) from the field, 2-for-9 (22.2%) from three, and 18-for-24 (75%) at the line.
Mikayla Miller, Hannah Howard (So., St. Paul, Minn.), and Miranda Rice (Fy., Forest Lake, Minn.) all finished in double-figures. Miller led the way with 15 points (6-16 FG, 2-4 3PT, 1-4 FT), Howard scored 10 (3-8 FG, 4-5 FT), and Rice added 10 (3-4 FG, 4-4 FT).
“I’m proud of this team and what it accomplished this season,” concluded Kelly. “For as young as this team is, to finish tied for third in the conference is a major accomplishment. We overcame some tough obstacles throughout the year and won a lot of close games and exceeded a lot of expectations. It hurts right now because the season is over and we have to say goodbye to two incredible seniors in Maddie and Emily, but as we step away from this season and reflect, I think we’ll find that we accomplished some great things.”