Women's Basketball: Senior Send-off! Raiders upset Monks on Senior Day

(Nashua, N.H.) The Rivier University Women's Basketball team sent their five seniors off in fashion as they upset visiting Saint Joseph's College (Maine), 66-61 on Senior Day at the Muldoon Gymnasium. Rivier, who fell in the team's first match up 71-54 back on Jan 14th, handed the Monks their first conference loss as they improve to 9-13 overall and 6-8 in the conference. Saint Joseph's is now 19-4 overall on the season and 13-1 in the GNAC.

The Raiders led by as many as 10 points in the second quarter, but the Monks rallied with a 6-0 run to close out the first half at 28-25. Saint Joseph's opened the second half with 10 unanswered points to push their lead to seven before the Raiders fought back. A fast break layup from senior Savanna Butterfield (Londonderry, N.H.) with 8:30 left gave Rivier a lead that they would not relinquish.

The final seconds saw a flurry of action as the Monks, trailing 64-61, were able to fire off several three-point attempts with 10 seconds before sophomore Megan Hamel (Colebrook, N.H.) stepped in front of a pass to the corner and stole the ball with five seconds remaining to secure the Raiders' first win over Saint Joseph's since January 12, 2013.

Senior Caitlyn Perry (Nashua, N.H.) finished the afternoon with a team-high 18 points and four assists. Sophomore Kaylee Kacavas (Dracut, Mass.) came off the bench and dropped 16 points with four blocked shots while Butterfield capped her home career with another double-double, 15 points, 10 rebounds and four blocked shots. Hamel, the unsung hero of the game, collected a game-high 14 rebounds.

Saint Joseph's was paced by sophomore Regan McFerran's (Albany, N.Y.) double-double effort of 12 points and 11 rebounds. Classmate Kelsi McNamara (West Newbury, Mass.) was the game-high scorer with 19 points and fellow sophomore Julia Champagne (Brunswick, Maine) ended with 11 points and seven assists. Sophomore Emily Benway (Rochester, N.H.) also had a solid afternoon with 6 points and 10 rebounds.

The Raiders will close out the 2016-17 regular season with a pair of road contests next week as they travel to Simmons College on Tuesday night before traveling to Anna Maria College on Saturday (2/18) afternoon. Saint Joseph's will also close out the season with two GNAC contests as they travel to Norwich (2/14) before hosting Simmons in their senior day next Saturday afternoon.