Having suffered a first-round exit last season from the NESCAC tournament, the Cardinals see this season as a fresh start with some young, talented, and eager players ready to take the court. The Cardinal roster only has 10 active players, with no seniors, but the team prepared in the pre-season to be competitive, enthusiastic, and energetic to face the challenges ahead of it.
“We have talent and heart that is going to surprise a lot of teams this year,” said Sam LaCroce ’12. “We are all willing to learn from each other, support each other, and just be a team.”
The Cardinals kicked off this season at the Stevens Institute Tournament where they faced Babson College, a team with five starters returning from last season’s squad. Wes stuck with the Beavers for the first eight minutes of the contest, playing to a 12-12 tie, but Babson quickly pulled away on a 14-0 run. The Cardinals remained at 12 points until the 5:54 mark when tri-captain McKinley Tennant ’11 was able to convert a layup. The Cardinals entered halftime down 33-19.
“Babson put on a full-court press which took us out of our game and caused us to commit many unnecessary turnovers,” Tennant said.
The Cardinals got no closer than 11 points in the second half as Babson pulled away to win 66-37 and move into the championship game. The Cards shot only 25 percent from the floor for the game and were only able to connect twice from long distance.
The next day, however, the Cardinals bounced back and were able to grab their first win of the season with a 70-54 victory over New Jersey City University in the consolation game. All members of the team saw some minutes, while LaCroce, Erin Gold ’11, and Eileen Gaffney ’12, who was later named to the All-Tournament team, all finished in double digits with 18, 14, and 13 points, respectively.
After returning to practice, the Cards were able to work out the problems from the first weekend and were able to demolish St. Joseph College 77-15 in West Hartford on Tuesday night and extend their winning streak against the Blue Jays to nine games.
Trailing 6-4 at the 16:46 mark, Cardinal head coach Kate Mullen called a 30 second timeout to settle the team down and explain that they needed to get the ball into the post. From that point on the Cards went on a 32-0 run to end the half at 36-6. The team kept on rolling in the second half and continued to play hard en route to a 62 point win, its largest margin of victory since an 82-17 win over SUNY-Maritime on Nov. 26, 2002. The Cardinals shot an exceptional 52.2 percent from the field while holding the Blue Jays to 10.9 percent shooting for the game.
All 10 players chipped in with Emily Lippe ’12, Melanie Ferdinand ’12, and Gaffney reaching double digits. Ferdinand also finished with 13 rebounds.
“It was really great and rewarding to have our entire team contributing in such a solid win,” Ferdinand said. “When everyone is able to work together and play hard we really become an amazing team as a whole.”
The Cardinals now stand 2-1 on the season and will head to Bridgewater State College on Saturday looking to build on the momentum from the win over St. Joseph College and improve to 3-1. Tip-off is scheduled for 3 p.m.
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