Drexel University
William & Mary
Dragons Come Up Short In 54-50 Thriller Versus William & Mary
1/27/2008 3:24:53 PM | Women's Basketball
Philadelphia - The Drexel Dragons saw victory slip through their hands in the final seconds of a 54-50 loss to William & Mary (9-10, 3-4 CAA). Drexel rallied from a six-point deficit with less than three minutes remaining and a four-point disparity with just 24 seconds left. Drexel (10-8, 5-2 CAA) had an opportunity to tie the game with nine ticks left and the ball under its own basket, but a pair or miscues resulted in the team's second excruciatingly close loss in as many games.
Gabriela Marginean recorded her fourth double-double of the year with 15 points and 11 rebounds. Freshman Jasmina Rosseel scored nine of her 10 points in the second half and was a key player in the team's comeback. The defense of Brooke Cornish was pivotal to the Drexel rally. She blocked four shots, three of them in less than a minute on back-to-back William & Mary possessions.
After pulling themselves back into the game multiple times, Drexel faced near certain defeat when Kyra Kaylor blocked a Marginean jumper on the wing with under a minute remaining and headed to the line on the other end with 24.4 on the clock and a four-point lead. The 84.2-percent free-throw shooter made the first but clanked the second. The Dragons quickly got the ball down the court for a layup by Cornish with 15.3 seconds left that made the score 52-50 in William & Mary's favor.
The Tribe inbounded the ball to its best free-throw shooter, Kaylor, near the baseline. The steady senior, who had put herself in position to be the hero of the game, inexplicably dribbled the ball off her foot and out of bounds with 13.7 seconds left. Coming out of a timeout, Drexel got the ball to Marginean under the basket. She dribbled across the lane, but lost the ball in the process. Cornish grabbed it and looked for a quick pass back to her, but it missed the mark and went out of bounds to the Tribe to end the game.
Cornish's blocks spurred a 7-0 run midway through the second half that chiseled a 10-point Tribe lead to three points, 40-37, on a full-court drive for a finger-roll layup by Jasmina Rosseel. The rookie knocked down a pair of free-throws minutes later to keep the game within Drexel's reach at 44-39 with 5:43 left.
Narissa Suber hit a tough pull-up jumper in the lane to narrow the lead to three points again at the 3:23 mark. Suber's bucket gave her 1,300 points in her career at Drexel. Rosseel would follow it up with another sprint-out layup to make it a 46-43 game and bring fans to their feet. After a deflating three-point play by Kyra Kaylor on the other end of the court the Dragons fought back with a layup by Cornish followed by a steal by Marginean in transition. Rosseel found space for a three-pointer on the elbow and did not miss, making it a one-point game at 49-48 with 1:54 to go.
The Dragons had an opportunity to knot the game at 49 all, after forcing the Tribe into a shot clock violation on its next possession. But after Cornish drew the Tribe's ninth team foul, she failed to connect on the front end of a one-and-one free-throw opportunity, setting up the game's conclusion.
Drexel bounced back from a horrid 27-percent shooting performance in the first half to outscore William & Mary 32-27 on 52.2 percent shooting in the second. The Dragons trailed by as much as 11 points in the first period and went into halftime behind 27-18.
In addition to her season-high tying four-block performance, Cornish also matched her best scoring performance of the season with eight points. Nicole Hester failed to reach double-figures for the first time in five games, but she did swipe a season-high four steals and hand out four assists.
The Dragons hit the road for a two-game swing. They face Northeastern first on Thursday, Jan. 31 and follow it up with a trip to Hofstra on Feb. 3.
