Senior Hannah Douglas blows past defenders
as DePauw squeaked past Wittenberg 62-58.
The women's; basketball team plays
again on Valentines day at Kenyon College.
SAM CARAVANA/THE DEPAUW
The last time DePauw University's women’s basketball team played an overtime game at Neal Fieldhouse Facebook hadn’t been invented, we didn’t have the iPhone and Brian Casey was still eight years away from named president of the university.
On Wednesday night, however, Wittenberg University became the first team to take the Tigers into overtime in 15 years, falling to the host Tigers 62-58.
Not to be overshadowed by the rare overtime occurrence, the victory gives DePauw its fourth straight North Coast Athletic Conference regular season title, something that means a lot to this group of seniors.
“Having four NCAC titles is an amazing feeling,” senior Emma Ondik said. “It’s an honor to win the conference and to have done it every year that I have been here is extremely special.”
“They’ve meant so much to the program and and as well to us younger players,” sophomore Lex Gaumer said. “Basically all we can do right now is try to learn from them with our time left and we’re just going to try and extend the season for as long as we can for them.”
For the Tigers, the victory didn’t come easy, as Wittenberg came out firing and jumped out to an early lead thanks to a 6-of-7 shooting start.
The Tigers quickly got to work erasing the deficit going on a 16-0 run that helped DePauw establish a comfortable nine point lead at halftime.
The visiting Tigers kept the margin fairly close for the majority of the second half, but didn’t really make their move until late in the game. Wittenberg’s Riley McDonald gave her team its first lead of the second half with just less than a minute and a half remaining with a layup to make the score 52-50.
Senior Savannah Trees responded for the Tigers, tying the game with the last basket of regulation with just over a minute left to play. The Tigers got one final chance to win the game in regulation but Trees’ shot with only seconds remaining was off the mark.
“Yeah, the last two minutes of regulation were very nerve wracking,” junior Morgan Skordos said.
The overtime period belonged to the Tigers, however as they held Wittenberg to just 2-of-7 shooting in the period and shot 75 percent for themselves.
The big swing came with just under two and half minutes to play when senior Hannah Douglas converted on a basket and drew a foul. The resulting three-point-play gave the Tigers a lead that they would not relinquish.
Douglas led all scorers, setting a new personal career-high at DePauw with 28 points, seven of which came in the overtime period. She had scored 31 points in a game earlier in her career when she attended Butler University.
Douglas went 12-of-18 from the floor and 4-of-5 from the free throw stripe. She even pitched in on the defensive end with three blocks.
Ondik also played a big role for the Tigers, contributing 11 points and leading the team with three assists.
All of this helped pick up Trees who, despite the game-tying basket, had an off night. DePauw’s leading scorer coming into the game against Wittenberg only shot 25 percent from the floor and her 10 points were almost six points lower than her average per game.
Even though the Tigers have locked up the title, players aren’t expecting Huffman to let them rest with two games left on the schedule against Kenyon College and Ohio Wesleyan University.
“I think we’re pedal to the metal,” Gaumer said. “We want to make sure that everybody knows that we’re here to play, make sure the nation knows that we’re here to play and that we’re ready to go for the tournament and hopefully farther into march.”
That ideology will surely please Ondik.
“I’m really just trying to enjoy every second of my last season ever,” Ondik said. “We really want to win the conference tournament, and ultimately we would love to win another national championship.”
Next up for the Tigers is a road test at Kenyon on Saturday afternoon with tipoff scheduled for 1 p.m.