Women's Basketball Hosts Manhattan Wednesday in 52nd Battle of the Bronx

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Bronx, N.Y. – The Rams (6-3) will look to begin its six-game homestand with a third straight win on Wednesday night when they welcome Manhattan (4-3) to the Rose Hill Gym. Tip-off is set for 7 p.m. on ESPN+, SNY, and WFUV. Although the game will only be live on ESPN+, it will re-air on SNY on Thursday at 2 p.m.

#SoniaStrong
Fans be sure to arrive early to pick up your #SoniaStrong t-shirts, presented by Ridgewood Savings Bank, to honor the memory of former Fordham and Manhattan assistant coach Sonia Burke. Sonia passed away this Summer after a courageous battle with cancer. She spent 13 years of her career with the Jaspers, including six as the associate head coach, before crossing the Bronx to join Coach Gaitley and our program for the last three years. We will be observing a moment of silence before the national anthem prior to tomorrow's contest. 
 
Last Time Out
Fordham led for nearly 36 minutes of Sunday's win over Princeton and used an explosive 15-0 run in the third quarter to cruise to an eventual nine-point win that appears closer than it was after Princeton's Abbey Meyers hit four three-pointers in the final 75 seconds. The Rams had a double-digit advantage in the second period but Princeton was able to whittle that down to just two at halftime, 33-31, and eventually took a couple of brief leads in the third quarter. At 41-40 midway through the third, the Rams finished the quarter on the aforementioned run, eventually leading by as much as 18 in the fourth.
 
Anna DeWolfe scored 28 points for the second straight game, doing so on 10-of-17 shooting, one of four Rams to finish in double figures. DeWolfe chipped in three steals and three assists over 40 minutes. Asiah Dingle and Kendell Heremaia each scored 14, the former notching four steals and the latter one of three players with exactly seven rebounds; the other two, Kaitlyn Downey and Megan Jonassen, finished with 10 and four points, respectively. Jonassen grabbed six offensive boards. Fordham shot 45.5% from the floor and hit 21-of-25 free throws.
 
Series History with Manhattan
This will be the 52^nd Battle of the Bronx since the rivalry first began in 1980, a 69-56 Jaspers win in Riverdale. Fordham holds a 27-24 advantage all-time, including a 17-8 mark inside the Rose Hill Gym. 11 of Manhattan's victories came when the two schools were in the MAAC together from 1982 to 1990. The Rams are currently riding a nine-game win streak over their crosstown rivals, all coming under head coach Stephanie Gaitley. In their most recent meeting in 2019, Anna DeWolfe scored 13, while Kaitlyn Downey produced an 11-point, 11-rebound double-double.
 
Triple D - DeWolfe, Dingle, Downey
Shut the front door! So far this season, the Fordham trio have been gnarly, righteous, dynamite, and, perhaps most importantly, the bomb-dot-com. All three already have one A-10 Player of the Week award in the first month of the season. Combined, they make up 66.3% of the team's scoring on a combined 41.2% shooting overall. They are the real deal. For context for the uninitiated, this entire blurb is related to Guy Fieri's Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives.
 
Hungry Like DeWolfe
Last year's Atlantic 10 Co-Player of the Year, junior captain Anna DeWolfe became the third Ram to average over 20 points per game in program history, finishing with 20.8 for the season, which ranked 22nd in the country, one of seven underclassmen in the top-25. The Cumberland, Maine native was also 25th in the nation with 37.3 minutes played per game and 29th with 2.7 threes per game. DeWolfe is up to 950 points for her career with an average of 16.1 over her first 59 contests at Fordham, all starts, beginning with her first collegiate game against #16 Notre Dame at home in front of a sold out Rose Hill Gym where she nearly triple-doubled (10 points, 9 rebounds, 9 assists) in a close five-point loss to the Irish. DeWolfe was a three-time Rookie of the Week and All-Rookie selection that year while leading all freshmen in minutes played (1,152).
 
DeWolfe has shaken off a slow start by her standards this season and is now leading the Atlantic 10 in scoring (19.0 points per game) on 42.5% overall shooting, 31.1% from distance, and 80.0% from the line. She also leads the team with 25 assists and is second with 15 steals. Her 353 total minutes rank second nationally, her 39.2 per-game average ranks fourth, and her 19.0 points rank 38th.
 
Three-for-Four
Through four weeks of the 2021-22 season, the Rams already have three different Atlantic 10 Players of the Week. First it was Asiah Dingle after averaging 26.0 points, 9.5 rebounds, 5.0 steals, and 3.0 assists over wins against Quinnipiac and Seton Hall. The week after it was Kaitlyn Downey after averaging 19.5 points at Notre Dame and against Michigan State, including a career-high-matching 24 points in the win over the Spartans. Now it's Anna DeWolfe, who scored 28 points in back-to-back wins over Stony Brook and Princeton this past week, with 4.0 assists and 3.0 steals.
 
Dingle All the Way
The Boston native was a shoe-in for the year's first A-10 Player of the Week award, averaging 26.0 points, 9.5 rebounds, 5.0 steals, and 3.0 assists over 39.5 minutes of two exciting wins to begin the campaign. Through nine contests, she leads the team in rebounding, assists, and steals, while also second in scoring. For her career across three schools, she has accumulated 1,155 points, an average of 13.0 per game, across 89 appearances and 72 starts. She is a 42.1% career shooting with 3.6 rebounds, 3.0 assists, and 2.1 steals per game.
 
Kendell Here-oh-my!
Kendell Heremaia became the 23^rd Ram to reach 1,000 points for her career, doing so at Seton Hall in the second game of this season, matching her career-high of 29 points and shooting a blistering 8-of-11 from behind the arc, just one off the single-game program record. The New Zealand international has since ascended to 20^th all-time with 1,072 career points and is currently seventh all-time with 183 made three-pointers, with Suzanne Maguire ('97) next at 200.
 
Heremaia has racked up 1,072 points, 680 rebounds, 279 assists, and 120 steals during her Fordham career to-date. Only six other Rams have reached the 1,000-point, 500-rebound, 200-assist, 100-steal plateaus, most recently Samantha Clark ('16), but also featuring Becky Peters ('12) and Abigail Corning ('14) that have played under Coach Gaitley. Among that group, Heremaia has the second-fewest points and third-fewest rebounds and steals, but the second-most assists.
 
Gaitley's "Most Challenging" Nonconference Schedule Yet
Fordham women's basketball head coach Stephanie Gaitley has called this year's nonconference slate her "most challenging" of any of her teams in her career. It features five predicted conference favorites (Quinnipiac, Baylor, Stony Brook, Princeton, Florida Gulf Coast), one runner-up (Manhattan), and three third-place finishers (Seton Hall, Michigan State, Houston), plus two NCAA champions (Baylor, Notre Dame), and six programs that received votes in at least one national preseason poll. With wins over one top-25 team (Princeton) and four top-100 teams (Quinnipiac, Michigan State, Houston, Stony Brook), the Rams are 60th in the initial NET rankings.
 
Chairwomen of the Boards
Fordham was beastly on the boards last year, averaging 38.4 per contest and with the 22nd-highest rebounding margin in the country (7.6), holding opponents to just 30.8 boards. The Rams grabbed 213-of-691 rebounds on the offensive glass, or 30.8%, and had six players with at least 17 offensive boards. Downey was 35th in the country with 10.2 rebounds per game and 11th overall with 8.5 defensive boards per game, while Jonassen was 20th with 3.9 o-boards per game. Jonassen (186-of-329) has more offensive boards in her career than defensive.
 
It's still early going in 2021-22, obviously, but through nine games, Fordham is averaging 33.1 boards per game with a whopping 107 offensive rebounds out of 298 (35.9%). Jonassen unsurprisingly leads the way with 24 o-boards with Asiah Dingle (22) and Millie Prior (15) each just behind her.
 
Nationally Speaking
It's early days this season but it's never TOO early to take a look at where Fordham stands among its' Division I peers. Still, the Rams are 42nd in free-throw percentage (.767), 69th in three-point attempts (181), and 101st in makes (52). Fordham is also 77th in total assists (122), 81st in turnovers per game (15.0), and 121st in assist-turnover ratio (0.90).
 
At the individual level, Anna DeWolfe is third in the nation in total minutes (353) and fourth in minutes played per game (39.2) and is also 38th in scoring (19.0), seventh in field-goal attempts (160) and 12th in makes (68). Asiah Dingle is 12th in steals (27) and 23rd with 3.0 steals per game, plus 41st in free throws made (35), while Kaitlyn Downey is 63rd with 13 blocks. Again, it's early.
 
This Is Our House
Since Coach Gaitley took over before the 2011-12 season, the Rams hold a 124-33 (79.0%) record at home across 157 contests. Over the last four-plus seasons, the Rams are 68-12 in the Rose Hill Gym, including a 34-6 mark in conference play and three straight Holiday Classic crowns. Fordham is currently riding nine straight wins in the Bronx.
 
60 is the Magic Number?
Fordham is 74-11 over its last five seasons when scoring 60 points or more, including an 8-3 mark last year and 6-0 record to begin this season. The offense has been clicking so far for the Rams, with five of their six wins coming with 70 or more points.
 
Preseason Poll
Fordham has been predicted to finish third in the annual Atlantic 10 preseason coaches poll, totaling 163 points among the 14 head coaches, just behind Dayton (193) and Rhode Island (174). The Rams return four of their five starters and 91% of their scoring from a year ago, while adding senior transfer Asiah Dingle and Australian U19 international Millie Prior. Anna DeWolfe, the reigning Co-Player of the Year, was selected to the preseason All-Conference First Team, while Kendell Heremaia was named to the Second Team.
 
Up Next
The Rams host Lafayette this Sunday, December 12, at 2 p.m. on ESPN+ and WFUV.