A half-court basket made in the final seconds of the third period by Rider senior guard Lexi Posset helped seal the game for the Binghamton women’s basketball team, as BU (5-5) ended the period down by one and was not able to regain the lead that it held by almost three quarters of the game, ultimately losing to Rider (4-5), 62-57.
Coming off a game against Niagara in which she scored zero points, sophomore guard Lizzy Spindler turned her entire game around, starting off strong with a 3-pointer less than two minutes into the game. Spindler also netted four more 3-pointers throughout the match, marking a career-high five in the game. Spindler now has a total of 18 3-pointers this season, putting her in the top 10 in the America East (AE) for 3-point field goals per game. Spindler also had a layup in the fourth quarter, ending the game with a career-high 17 points. However, she had six turnovers throughout the game, something that the team as a whole struggled with. Binghamton turned the ball over 28 times during the match.
“I think that we just need to clean up the little mistakes that were happening,” Spindler said. “Boxing out, turnovers, simple things — and they are simple things — so we can definitely clean them up really easily. Especially coming into conference play, I think it’s really important to. This game was a really tough loss, and we should have won, but we have to bounce back from it.”
Other top scorers for Binghamton were senior forward Rebecca Carmody and junior guard Carly Boland, who each had 13 points. Eleven of Carmody’s points came in the first half, as she battled with injuries all throughout the second half. After falling one too many times, Carmody was taken out of the game and could not finish the last five minutes. Boland and Carmody were also matched in rebounds, as both came away with a total of five. Carmody is positioned in the No. 2 spot for rebounding in the AE Conference, only behind Albany senior forward Heather Forster.
“[Carmody] is not just a rebounder,” said BU head coach Bethann Shapiro Ord. “She can score, and when she’s on her game, she can shoot the three, she can attack the rim, she can rebound for us and I think in the past, that was one of the things people would say: She can just rebound, rebound, rebound, but the kid has a grit about her that can make her score. She’s a scorer.”
Even though the Bearcats excelled in several areas, they had just one steal by Spindler in the third period as opposed to Rider’s 18 steals. Half of those steals came from Rider’s junior guard Stella Johnson, who was able to net 21 out of Rider’s 62 points. While Johnson had the most steals and points for the team, Posset was not far behind with 19 points and five steals.
“It was a tough loss,” Shapiro Ord said. “It’s one of those things that we talk about and try to work on, but we just have to do little things because they do add up.”
The Bearcats have just over a week to recover from back-to-back losses before taking on No. 2 Notre Dame. The game is scheduled to tip off at 1 p.m. on Sunday, Dec. 16 from Purcell Pavilion in Notre Dame, Indiana.