Late rally not enough to overcome first half struggles
Emmanuelle Tahane’s terrific week helped her earn A-10 Player of the Week honors. PHOTO CREDIT: Greg Clark
After extending their historic win streak to 13 games following a 58-45 victory against Fordham University, the URI women’s basketball team had that streak snapped by the University of Dayton in a 47-37 result.
In their first game, Rhody faced Fordham in a battle of the Rams, and they delivered for their supporters. The first half of the Sunday afternoon contest was all offense from both sides, as a balanced scoring effort from Rhode Island and a few threes from Fordham’s Anna Dewolfe made the score 19-15 after one quarter in favor of the Rams in Keaney blue.
The second quarter was more of the same with grad student Dez Elmore doing most of the heavy lifting, scoring six of her game-high 16 points in the stanza. For Fordham, it was buckets from Megan Jonassen, the senior forward, who kept them in the game. At the half, Rhode Island led 34-26.
The Rams pumped up their defensive intensity in the second half. Great defense from Rhody’s Chanell Williams, who finished with a game-high five steals, as well as Emmanuelle Tahane, held Fordham to under double-digit scoring in each of the final two quarters. That, combined with balanced scoring from Elmore, Tahane and sophomore guard Dolly Cairns allowed the Rams to pull away and earn their 13th straight win of the season by a score of 58-45.
Tahane was everywhere for Rhody, contributing 15 points and a whopping 16 rebounds. Williams also contributed nine points to go along with her five steals.
While the win streak is completely unprecedented for the team, Tahane emphasized afterwards that the streak is not the end goal for the Rams.
“The success has been great, but we want to achieve more,” Tahane said. “Our goal is a regular season and conference tournament title. We are going to stay focused until we get there.”
Rhody had an opportunity to extend their streak to 14 and establish a two-game lead in the Atlantic 10 when they faced off against second place Dayton in front of 2,415 fans at the Ryan Center, a record for a women’s standalone game.
It was not the start the Rams wanted though as they were unable to reach double-digit scoring in the first or second quarter thanks to stellar defense from the Flyers. Huge shots from Cairns and free throws from senior forward Marie-Paule Foppossi allowed the Rams to hang in the game. Dayton would go into the half with a 27-15 lead.
The Rams wouldn’t go out quietly. A third quarter surge brought Rhody right back into the fold. Once again, it was Cairns and Foppossi who did the majority of the scoring, but great team defense from the Rams allowed them to slowly march back into the game. They cut it to 34-30 after a Tahane layup with less than a minute to play, but Araion Bradshaw knocked down a three at the buzzer to push the lead back to 37-30.
The Rams continued to battle, but the experienced and talented Flyers were able to extend possessions and get timely offensive rebounds, killing any chance for a Rhode Island comeback. The Flyers would go on to win 47-37.
While the loss was disappointing for Reiss and her squad, she shared her appreciation for the crowd in attendance.
“I want to thank everyone who came out tonight,” Reiss said. “We are sorry we couldn’t get you the win, but we love having people in the building.”
The Rams will look to start a new win streak on Saturday when they hit the road to take on the University of Richmond at 4 p.m. on ESPN+.