Women's Basketball Makes it Three Straight with Win over Boston College

Box Score
 
Bronx, N.Y. – The Rams never trailed, and the game was tied just once early on, as the Fordham women's basketball team controlled its nonconference match-up with ACC opponent Boston College from start to finish in a 56-49 victory over the Eagles on Sunday afternoon in the Rose Hill Gym. With the result, the Rams improve to 6-2 on the season, while Boston College falls to 2-6.
 
"I'm really proud of the team effort today," Head coach Stephanie Gaitley said, "It was a great sign of our maturity beating an ACC team after an emotional win over Duquesne on Thursday."
 
Junior forward G'mrice Davis scored a career-high 22 points on a career-high nine field goals to go with nine rebounds, three assists, and a steal in 32 minutes. It is the second straight 20-point game by a Ram, after Danielle Burns' 22 points on Thursday against Duquesne, after not having one over the first six games of the campaign. Kate Kreslina added 13 points on 4-of-6 shooting, including 3-of-4 from deep, in a team-high 35 minutes.
 
Davis scored Fordham's first 10 points of the contest, a layup on the game's first possession, four straight free throws, plus another layup and a jumper over the first 4:39. Boston College's Martina Mosetti briefly tied things up with a jumper on the Eagles' first offensive possession, but it was the lone tie of the game. Boston College never held a lead. Fordham outscored the Eagles, 16-10, in the first quarter, similar to the team's seven-point lead over the Dukes after one period of play on Thursday. Boston College rounded out the frame by shooting 4-of-5 from the field, with six points coming from Emma Guy, but Fordham continually answered through two mid-range jumpers from Tiffany Suarez and a layup from Mary Goulding off the bench.
 
Fordham and Boston College both shot 5-of-11 in the second quarter but the Rams made 3-of-7 from downtown as opposed to the Eagles' 0-of-2 mark, and committed just one turnover against Boston College's four. Mariella Fasoula, who finished with 20 points on 10-of-15 shoting, made a layup and Guy  made her fourth basket of the game after Davis drained another jumper to get within four points but Fordham went on an 8-0 run to take a 12-point lead, 26-14, with four minutes to play in the half. Kreslina canned a wide-open look from deep, Davis hit another mid-range shot, and Hannah Missry kept her streak up of hitting at least one three-pointer in every single game after Suarez found the senior with a nice pass across the court. Fordham went into the break up nine, 29-20.
 
The Rams had nine more shots than the Eagles and shot worse (37.9% to 45.5%) but Boston College committed 10 turnovers, while Fordham made a season-low two to go with 10 assists. Davis finished the half with 14 points, four rebounds, and two assists.  
 
Davis and Kreslina kept up their pace with six and five points, respectively, over a 13-point third quarter. Boston College shot 7-of-13 from the field for a 15-13 advantage in the period but committed an additional five turnovers. The Eagles ended the period with a 6-2 run that got the lead down to seven, eventually pushed to five on Fasoula's layup to start the fourth, 42-37.
 
Boston College got within five four times in the fourth quarter but couldn't get over that hump. Danielle Burns, who had been held scoreless over the first three frames, came alive in the frame with some timely shots. After Fasoula's layup, Burns drained a mid-range jumper, and after Kelly Hughes made a layup after an offensive rebound, Kreslina and Burns strung together three shots over three minutes to get the lead back to double digits. That wouldn't last long, however, as the Eagles rebounded with an 8-2 run to again have the deficit at five. There was just 30 seconds to play at this point, though, and the dagger came on an inbounds pass from Kreslina to Davis completely unmarked streaking into the paint for a layup to go up seven, which would become the eventual final margin of victory.
 
Under Stephanie Gaitley, the Rams have now won 34 straight games when holding their opponents below 50 points. Since Gaitley came on, Fordham has a 43-4 record in such instances and are 3-0 this season. The Rams narrowly missed out on adding to this streak on Thursday but Duquesne finished with 51 points.

Despite the score, Boston College held advantages in most categories. The Eagles shot 49% from the field (24-for-49), while the Rams scored at a 38.9% clip (21-for-54), and both teams struggled from deep, with Fordham's 20% (4-of-20) mark besting Boston College's 12.5% (1-of-8). Coming into this contest, Missry and Hughes were in the top-five among active Division I players for most career three-pointers. Missry had one and Hughes missed both of her attempts as the Rams defense keyed in on her whenever she had the ball.

Missry's lone make, however, was the 256th of her career and moves her into the all-time top 10 in Atlantic 10 history, tied with Amra Mehmedic (Saint Joseph's '04) and Erin Shields (Saint Joseph's '14).
 
The Rams committed season-lows of seven turnovers and nine fouls; a welcome sight after the team had racked up 30 and 32, respectively, over the previous two games. Another season-low was Fordham's 24 team rebounds on the day.
 
Fordham travels to Iona on Wednesday afternoon for a 4 p.m. meeting before returning home to play the six remaining nonconference contests in December.