Women's College Basketball
Rider University 80 Iona College 76
Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference Game
LAWRENCEVILLE--On the strength of a career-high 22 points from senior Alyssa Parsons (Ivyland, Pa./Archbishop Wood) the Rider University women's basketball team snapped a 10-game losing streak with a Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference win over Iona College on Friday evening in Alumni Gymnasium.
"February is a time for your seniors to step up and Alyssa did that tonight," said head coach Lynn Milligan. "I am very proud of how she handled the team."
"The ball went in for me tonight," Parsons said. "Iona was playing strong defense and when my teammates got trapped, they started looking for me on the outside and I was able to make the shots. I give them all the credit for getting me some good looks on the floor."
Trailing 73-66, Rider (11-15, 3-12 MAAC) went on an 11-0 run, five points by junior Carleigh Brown (Philadelphia, Pa./Nazareth Academy) and four points by sophomore MyNeshia McKenzie (Springfield, Pa./Springfield (Delco)) as the Broncs took a 77-73 lead with 48.4 seconds left.
"This was a heck of a performance by our ball club," said Milligan. "We grinded the game out, there is no quit in us and there hasn't been any quit all season. This is a tough, tough group."
"I got a good vibe from my teammates before the game," McKenzie said.
McKenzie finished with 19 points and added nine rebounds and three assists, playing all 40 minutes. C. Brown finished with a career-high 14 points and added eight rebounds, four on the offensive glass while dishing out two assists in 30 minutes.
A three-pointer by Iona's Kristina Ford cut Rider's lead to 77-76 with 31.9 seconds left. Ford finished with 12 points for the Gaels.
Parsons hit two free throws with 16.4 seconds left and McKenzie hit one of two free throws with 3.1 seconds remaining for the final score. Rider was 14 for 21 from the charity stripe.
Iona (10-16, 6-9 MAAC) was led by 34 points from freshman Damika Martinez.
"Both teams battled and got good looks on the offensive end," Milligan said. "Each team left it all on the floor. Both teams were doing whatever they had to do to win the ball game."
Trailing 57-53, Iona went on a 13-4 run, four points by Martinez as the Gaels took a 66-61 lead with 10:07 left in the game. Martinez added three blocks, two assists and two steals in 38 minutes.
Freshman Emily Fazzini (Wayne, Pa./Archbishop Carroll) hit a driving layup to bring Rider to within three (66-63) before the Gaels scored the next six points, opening up a 72-63 lead with 6:57 left. Fazzini finished with 14 points and added five rebounds and three assists in 29 minutes.
Trailing 2-0, Rider went on a 9-0 run, five points from McKenzie as the Broncs took a 9-2 lead 4:22 into the game.
Parsons hit back to back three-pointers, giving Rider an eight-point lead six minutes into the game and a jumper and three-pointer by Fazzini put Rider ahead 20-7 with 13:04 left in the opening half. Both teams were eight for 19 from long distance on the night.
Rider opened the game shooting 63 percent from the field, 67 percent from three-point range.
Trailing 26-12, Iona went on a 10-2 run, cutting the Bronc lead to six (28-22) with 6:14 left in the opening half.
C. Brown grabbed an offensive rebound and scored a layup with 4:40 left in the first half, putting Rider ahead 30-22.
Iona responded by scoring six of the next eight points, cutting Rider's lead to 32-28, 3:20 before the half and Rider led 40-35 at intermission.
Iona cut the Rider lead to 52-50 before junior Dior Brown (Upper Darby, Pa./Upper Darby) had an offensive rebound and put back and Parsons followed with her sixth three-pointer of the game making the score 57-53 Broncs with 14:36 left. D. Brown had five points, three rebounds, an assist and a steal in 18 minutes off the bench.
Also for the Broncs, junior Caitlin Bopp (Baltimore, Md./Institute of Notre Dame) had four points and nine rebounds, four on the offensive glass in 23 minutes. Bopp moved into seventh place all-time on Rider's career rebound list with 629, passing Leanne Moore who pulled down 624 boards from 2002-05.
Tonight was Rider's Play 4 Kay game, raising donations and support for the Kay Yow Foundation in the fight against breast cancer.
"When push comes to shove, we get to play basketball and there are people out there going through a lot tougher things," Milligan said. "When you get a chance to give a little back and experience a 'Play 4 Kay' game, it really puts things in the proper perspective for us. Kay Yow was a pioneer and an icon in the game of women's basketball."
Yow was the head coach at North Carolina State for over 30 seasons before passing away after a long battle with breast cancer.
Rider avenged a 64-50 loss at Iona on January 13. Rider has now won 13 of the 33 games in the all-time series.
"We did a better job of passing than when we played them the first time," Milligan added. "We forced some shots the first time around and tonight we made that extra passed which got us some higher percentage shots."
Rider had 15 assists in the game.
Rider out-shot the Gaels 46 percent to 42 percent and held a 42-37 advantage on the glass.
Iona's last trip to Alumni Gym was also an epic battle as Rider prevailed 93-87 in double-overtime on February 6, 2011.
Rider travels to Loudonville, New York for a MAAC game at Siena on Sunday at 2:10pm.
The final home game of the regular season will be Sunday, February 26 against Fairfield at 1pm on ESPN3.
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