In what has been one of its most successful seasons since moving to Division I, the Binghamton University women’s basketball team is set to head into the upcoming America East tournament as the third seed.
Binghamton has never made much noise in the conference tournament as symmetry has defined its fate in each of the last six years. The Bearcats have played in the No. 4 vs. No. 5 matchup each year, winning three times as the No. 4 seed and losing three times as the No. 5 seed. The team has never advanced past the semifinals.
But Binghamton looks for this year to be different as its 18-11 (11-5 AE) record is its best heading into the tournament since its 19-9 (10-6 AE) mark in 2002.
This year’s team was extremely successful early in the season while lone senior Jackie Ward began the year on the bench as she recovered from ankle surgery. In those games juniors Andrea Holmes and Viive Rebane cemented their places as team leaders, while sophomore Kara Elofson and freshman Jasbriell Swain stepped in and impressed as role players.
Scattered through the Bearcats’ season were five conference losses, but in their second-to-last game they defeated Boston University to take over second place in the AE with just one game to play.
But in that vital win for Binghamton came a devastating injury.
Midway through the second half, star guard Andrea Holmes came up limping on defense and was unable to walk off the court. Tests revealed a torn ACL in her left knee and she is out for the remainder of the year.
Undoubtedly the team’s leader, Holmes was averaging just over 14 points per game in conference play, good for fourth in the AE and nearly three points more than fellow junior Bearcat Viive Rebane.
The team trailed 43-40 when Holmes went down, but the Bearcats then worked together and staged a game-changing 17-6 run to go ahead by eight. Four different Bearcats scored in the stretch that took the lead and sealed the important victory. Head coach Nicole Scholl was ecstatic with the way her team responded to Holmes’ injury.
“Fantastic. I mean case in point, we pulled away with a win without our starting point guard who’s started since her freshman year,” she said. “I don’t know if I’ve seen [our players] as focused as what they were tonight. They just seemed determined that it didn’t matter who was on the floor, we were going to win this game.”
But in their regular season finale, the Holmes-less Bearcats dropped to third place with a loss at eighth-place Stony Brook on Saturday.
Holmes’ presence will surely be missed. Possibly her biggest contribution in the latter part of this season was the attention she drew from opposing defenses. But with her offensive threat now gone, those defenders will be able to shift their focus to other Bearcats as they did on Saturday.
Upon returning from her early season surgery, Ward gave the team stability and leadership. By far her best game this season came on Jan. 29 at home against the University of Maine Black Bears when she single-handedly staged a 12-0 run to spark her team to a 70-56 victory. Ward finished with a season-high 20 points to go along with seven rebounds and five assists.
The consistent play of Viive Rebane and Kara Elofson gives Binghamton a steady inside presence. The duo ranked among the leaders in the AE in field goal percentage and rebounding while Rebane ranked second in those categories.
But by far the biggest surprise on the boards for Binghamton has been the play of its newest addition, freshman Jasbriell Swain.
Standing at just 5 feet 8 inches, she finished fifth in the conference in rebounding with just under eight per game and 10th in steals with 1.7 per game. Swain has been named AE Conference Rookie of the Week five times, more than any other Bearcat in the history of the program.
With Holmes’ year over, Scholl’s implementation of her bench players will be critical if BU intends on making a run in the tournament. Only two non-starters saw significant playing time this season in twin juniors Orla and Sinead O’Reilly.
But in Saturday’s loss at Stony Brook, Scholl was forced to dig deeper into a bench that had not seen much action this season as sophomore Simone Thomas and freshmen Kyra Aloizos and Stephanie Jensen all saw action.
“Those kids came in and played with a lot of energy,” Scholl said. “[They] tried to compete to the best of their ability and that’s all we ask for, just to play as hard as you can for as long as you can.”
When the Bearcats take the floor on Friday in the America East tournament it will be against the sixth-seeded University of New Hampshire Wildcats, a team that hasn’t posed much of a problem for Binghamton this season.
In both of the teams’ matchups this year the Bearcats came out victorious. Holmes’ 24 points at the Events Center gave the team a 72-60 win, and in New Hampshire Rebane recorded her 10th career double-double with 22 points and 11 rebounds to lead Binghamton to a 59-50 win. Holmes added 20 points of her own.
But this time around, Binghamton must find a way to make up for the absence of its star.
“Our defense has been key for us all year long and they need to continue to defend,” Scholl said. “I don’t think any one player is going to be able to account for Andrea’s scoring, it’s going to have to be a balance from everybody.”
Tip-off is scheduled for 2:15 p.m. Friday in Hartford.