The BG women’s basketball team continued its winning streak in the Women’s National Invitational Tournament with a 61-54 win against the Atlantic-10 Conference’s Duquesne Dukes.
The Falcons’ win was greatly helped by double-digit scoring from guard Jillian Halfhill and forward Jill Stein.
“Anything can happen in March,” Coach Jennifer Roos said. “And today, our team came out and played extremely well against a team, in my opinion, an extremely talented team.”
Duquesne started off with a physical game plan BG had trouble with on both sides of the ball. The Dukes began with a layup and stopped BG from scoring for the first three minutes of the game.
Forward Alexis Rogers made the Falcons’ first point of the game with a free throw, but missed her second at the 16:59 mark in the first half.
The first field goal BG made came from forward Danielle Havel nearly five minutes into the half. The basket started BG’s offensive push for the rest of the half.
The Falcons went on a seven-point run following three free throws made by Halfhill.
The two teams went back and forth for most of the half. Duquesne went on an eight-point run in the last three minutes but Halfhill ended it with a three-point shot on the Falcons’ last possession of the half.
The Falcons ended the half trailing the Dukes, 29-25.
BG started off the second half with a turnover as Duquesne capitalized on the mistake with a layup to extend its lead to six, which would be the largest lead it would hold.
The Falcons and Dukes continued to go back and forth scoring and missing baskets. However, Stein went on a hot streak of 13 consecutive points, which helped push the Falcons ahead of the Dukes in the final moments.
“Sometimes as a player you’re just confident,” Stein said. “And I knew my team was confident in me.”
Stein recorded a career-high 16 points.
The next opponent will be Drexel, which defeated Harvard this past Saturday, 82-72.
Drexel finished third in the Colonial Athletic Association but lost to the No. 15 ranked Delaware Blue Hens in the conference tournament. They defeated Iona 59-50 in the opening round of the WNIT.
The Falcons will host the Drexel Dragons at 7 p.m. at the Stroh Center on Thursday.
