Women's Basketball at Richmond Sunday

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Game Notes
 
Bronx, N.Y. – The Fordham women's basketball team (16-8, 8-3) will look to carry its momentum from its four-game win streak and wild last-second win over Davidson on Thursday night into Sunday afternoon's game at Richmond (12-13, 5-6). Tip-off is set for 2 p.m. with ESPN+ and WFUV 90.7 FM carry live coverage.
 
Lace Up 4 Pediatric Cancer
In what has become a yearly tradition, the Rams wore yellow shoelaces for their game at George Mason to raise money and awareness for pediatric cancer research. Though it's over, fans can always continue to contribute. To make a donation, see Fordham's team page. To learn more about Go4TheGoal and its mission, click here. 
 
Play4Kay
Sunday's game at Richmond is the Spiders' Play4Kay game. In 2020, fans have the opportunity to pledge per free throw made by their team during the month of February. To pledge, fans can find their team on the leaderboard of the free throw challenge at KayYow.com.
 
Last Time Out
Thursday night's last-second 47-46 win over Davidson was the epitome of a slugfest. 12 lead changes, two ties, and neither team shooting above 36.0% on the night. After giving up a season-high 74 points on the road to the Wildcats a month ago, Fordham held them to a season-low 46 points, while Bre Cavanaugh took center stage in the final minute of action. The Rams missed their first 15 three-point attempts of the night until Cavanaugh's game winner, what would have been a new program record for attempts without a make. The two schools traded baskets over the opening 10 minutes, with the Rams holding a slim 14-13 advantage heading to the second. Defense was prominent in the second frame with a combined 17 points from the two teams on 6-of-30 shooting. The Rams mustered just six points while Davidson took a 9-2 run into halftime with a 24-21 lead. The lead grew to its largest for either team with 6:24 to play, 31-22, but the Rams began to whittle the deficit down, eventually getting within three, 33-30, at the end of the third. The Wildcats went back up seven, 44-37, with five minutes to play, but Fordham closed the game with a 10-2 run. In the final minute, Cavanaugh stole an inbounds pass from Ally Welling, was fouled, putting the Rams in the bonus, hit both free throws, then, after Welling made up for her turnover with a jumper with five seconds to play, Cavanaugh drilled a turnaround three in front of her bench for the win.
 
Cavanaugh scored 18 of her 20 points in the second half, adding nine rebounds and four steals over 40 minutes. Anna DeWolfe also played the entire contest, contributing 10 points with four boards and two steals. Kaitlyn Downey chipped in six points, eight rebounds, a team-high four assists, and one block. With Kendell Heremaia in foul trouble and held to a season-low 20 minutes, Vilisi Tavui came off the bench for four points and five rebounds across a career-high 26 minutes.
 
Series History vs. Richmond
The Spiders hold a 13-8 all-time series lead since 1988, when Richmond won, 61-55, on a neutral court in Atlanta. The Spiders won 10 straight over a 10-year period between 2003 and 2013, but the Rams have held serve in recent years, taking seven of nine since. Last year, Fordham prevailed, 60-48, in the Bronx. In that contest, Bre Cavanaugh flirted with a triple-double, posting a big line of 20 points, 12 rebounds, and seven assists, the latter two were career-highs. Two seasons ago, Cavanaugh struggled with her shot, scoring a career-low four points, but grabbed eight rebounds and shared the team-high of three assists with Zara Jillings.
 
Hungry Like DeWolfe
Freshman Anna DeWolfe earned her second A-10 Rookie of the Week award on Monday after helping the Rams to a pair of wins with 15.0 points on 50.0% scoring. She was also the team's first award-getter back on November 25.
 
Atlantic 10 Action
The Rams are 8-3 in league play and are outscoring opponents by 5.7 points while shooting  39.9% from the floor. Bre Cavanaugh has been scorching hot, averaging 21.9 points on 41.3% shooting and 88.5% from the charity stripe. Kendell Heremaia's producing 10.7 points, 7.6 rebounds, 2.6 assists, and 2.4 steals per game. The offense has been fantastic inside the arc (47.0%) but have struggled from long distance, converting just 27.8% attempts, similar to opponents' mark of 28.5%. Still, the Rams are committing just 10.4 turnovers per contest and rarely hurt themselves.
 
Busy Bre
Bre Cavanaugh has started all 92 contests in her Fordham career and has been nothing short of spectacular for the Rams during her time in maroon and white. The redshirt junior became the third-fastest Ram to reach 1,000 career points, doing so in 60 contests, and has already joined the all-time top-five in scoring, amassing 1,618 career points, now fourth-most all-time. The Allamuchy, N.J. native has racked up 3,530 career minutes thus far out of a possible 3,710 (95.2%), finishing each of the last two seasons within the top-10 in that category nationally and doing so again this year. She's already moved into the top-10 for three-pointers, now sixth with 192, is fourth with 360 free throws, sixth with 533 field goals, and is third all-time with a 17.6 point-per-game average. She has been held to single digit scoring just nine times in her career and has 40 games of 20 or more points. She has played under 30 minutes just once in her career - a blowout win over Iona during her rookie season. This season, she leads the Atlantic 10 with 19.1 points per game, ranked 22nd in Division I, and leads the conference with an 86.2% free-throw rate. She's in the top-75 for several categories nationally, as well, which you can see over the next few pages.
 
This is Our House
Since Gaitley took over before the 2011-12 season, the Rams hold a 110-31 (78.0%) record at home across 141 contests. Over the last four seasons, the Rams are 54-11 in the Rose Hill Gym, including a 25-5 mark in conference play and three straight Holiday Classic crowns. Last year, Fordham finished 12-4 at home overall and 6-2 in league action.
 
Defense, Defense, Defense
No stat better represents the Gaitley-infused defense than Fordham's 73-7 record when holding opponents under 50 points during her tenure. Three Januarys ago, Saint Joseph's defeated the Rams, 47-44, at Hagan Arena in Philadelphia, ending a streak of 38 consecutive contests with such victories. The last time before that loss, coincidentally, was also against the Hawks, in the 2013 A-10 Championship game at the Barclays Center, 47-46. The team's 47-44 loss to VCU last January 16th snapped a streak of 16 straight wins. The team's 48-44 loss at Dayton broke a stretch of 11 such games, but holding La Salle to 45 points last Saturday put them back in the right column.
 
Cavanaugh, Heremaia Back-to-Back as A-10 Players of the Week
Kendell Heremaia picked up her first career conference accolade after nearly triple-doubling in the big win over Samford to begin this year's Holiday Classic, while Cavanaugh garnered her second award of the season and the sixth of her career by averaging 24.0 points with no turnovers in two wins two weeks ago. Bre also earned Atlantic 10 Player of the Week honors on December 9 after averaging a 22-point, 11-rebound double-double over two wins last week. The next day, she earned the same distinction from the Metropolitan Basketball Writers Association and was named National Jesuit Player of the Week by the AJCU.
 
Rams in the Pros
G'mrice Davis, who graduated in 2017, currently plays professionally with Bnot Hertzeliya in Israel after spending time in Greece with GAS Kalyvion and Australia with the Rockland Cyclones, which featured her former teammate and 2019 graduate Mary Goulding. Lauren Holden, who graduated in 2019, immediately transitioned into coaching, joining up with former associate head coach Angelika Szumilo at Fairleigh Dickinson as one of her assistants. 
 
Up Next
The Rams travels to Saint Louis for the Billikens' Kids Day on Wednesday at 11 a.m.