Women’s basketball cools off, drops two to conference opponents

The Middlebury women’s basketball team hit a bit of a rough patch to open conference play last weekend, falling on the road to both Tufts and Bates by double digits. The losses dropped their record to 9-3 overall, and an unexpected 0-2 in NESCAC play following a very strong start to the season.
“The weekend was tough, but we were able to identify a few key things that we can take forward going into the rest of conference play,” said co-captain Lauren Sanchez ’11.
The Panthers opened conference play against Tufts last Friday. Tufts went up by three after a 17-17 tie in the middle of the first half and would not trail for the remainder of the game. The Jumbos led 31-26 at halftime.
Middlebury was able to keep the game close towards the beginning of the second half, but Tufts eventually started to pull away in the final 10 minutes of the game. Middlebury trailed by 23 at one point, the largest deficit they have faced all season, and went on to lose by a final score of 70-54. Maddie Moreau ’12 and Sanchez ’11 were the high scorers for the Panthers, as both would finish with 12 points on the night. Middlebury shot a paltry 39 percent on the evening from the floor.
The next day took the Panthers to Maine for a NESCAC matchup against Bates College. In a game that was strikingly similar to the Tufts contest, Middlebury would keep it close until midway through the second half, when a Bates run all but sealed the game for the Bobcats.
Middlebury trailed Bates for most of the first half due to poor shooting, but caught fire towards the end of the first 20 minutes, cutting what had been an 8-point deficit to a more manageable 35-30 halftime score.
As they did against Tufts the previous day, the Panthers managed to hang around at the start of the second half, but the Bobcats used two key second half runs to put the game away for good. Bates used a 10-2 run to go ahead by 11 points with 15 minutes remaining, then stuck the dagger right into the heart of Middlebury’s comeback hopes with a 15-5 run that started at the 10 minute mark of the half and had them leading by a margin of 67-51 with four minutes to play.
Bates would go on to win by a final score of 72-58. Sanchez led all Middlebury scorers with 13 points, and Moreau and Katie Petit ’14 both hit double figures, scoring 11. The Panthers shot an even worse field goal percentage against Bates than they had against Tufts, hitting only 31 percent of their shots, including only four of the sixteen three-point attempts they took on the night.
The Panthers will look to rebound from this tough weekend and turn their fortunes around in NESCAC play when they take on two conference rivals at home in Pepin Arena. First up is bottom-feeding Wesleyan on Friday night. The Cardinals are currently tied for last place in the league and have the worst overall record, 6-8. Following the Wesleyan matchup is a game against Connecticut College, who is experiencing similar on-court woes, also tied for last and with an overall record of 7-8.
“The team is focusing on Wesleyan and Conn. College in order to get back on track from the tough losses last weekend,” said Sanchez.