Rivier Women’s Hoops Holds on For 3 Point Win

Nashua, NH -  In what seemed to be an exact mirror recreation of the Rivier/Emerson men's basketball game just 3 days ago (Which the Raiders won by 2 points after being down by 10 with two minutes left to play), the Rivier women found themselves up by 10 points with 2 minutes left in the game.  Although, this time the Raiders were able to hang on down the stretch to secure their third straight victory and improve their GNAC record to 2-0.

The Raiders held a 9 point lead, 31-22, at the half after Rivier went on an 11-2 Run to close out the half.  During that span, sophomore Sarah Howard (W. Greenwich, RI) came up big, draining a 3-pointer and scoring 7 of the Raiders 11 points.  In the second half, Rivier extended the lead to as many as 16 points before the Lions started chipping away.  With ten minutes to play, Emerson's Amy Sherman hit a clutch 3-pointer to bring the Lions to 10 points at 46-36.  The two team matched each other shot for shot over the next 8 minutes, with each team hitting multiple 3-pointers, jump shots and foul shots to keep pace. 

With 1:57 left to play, the comeback began for the Lions.  Elissa Chojnicki (Dover, NH) hit a 3-pointer to cut the lead to 7 and Olivia DiNucci (Pittsburgh, PA) followed that with a lay-up to cut the Raider lead to 5 points.  Rivier Freshman Erin Sweeney (Chicopee, MA) hit 4 clutch free throws to keep a cushion for the Raiders to work with, but as the clock fell below 30 seconds to play the Lions went into foul mode to give themselves as many chances as possible.  It almost worked as the Raiders missed 4 of 6 free throws down the stretch and a 3-pointer by DiNucci brought the Lions to within 1 point at 65-64.  After an Emerson timeout the Raiders were able to inbound the ball and freshman Britney Lane (Waterford, VT) was fouled and sent to the line to shoot two.  Lane came up big, draining both free throws to give the Raiders a 3 point lead with 1 second to play.  Emerson inbounded the ball to half court, but was unable to get a shot off before the buzzer sounded, giving the Raiders a 67-64 win.

Rivier was led by junior Amandra Purcell (Hudson, NH) who scored 12 points and had 4 assists and 8 rebounds.  Britney Lane scored 11 points on 3 of 5 from the floor and 3 of 4 from the free throw line.  Sarah Howard also reached double digit points with 10 and had 2 assists along with 4 rebounds.  Freshman Jackie Penniman played well off the bench, scoring 9 points and grabbing 4 rebounds.  Steph Adams (Nashua, NH) grabbed a game high 14 rebounds.

Olivia DiNucci led all scorers with 23 points while Elissa Chojnicki dropped in 13 and Kathy Andrade (Hull, MA) scored 11 points and grabbed 11 rebounds.  The Lions owned the offensive glass, but couldn't capitalize on the 18-9 advantage, shooting just 30.9 % from the floor.

The Raiders will host St. Joseph's College (Me.) on Saturday at 12:00 PM.