Articles

Vermont Women's Basketball Falls to La Salle at Blue Sky Classic

Details: Created on Saturday, 31 December 2011 03:12; Written by George Commo

Explorers score a 68-59 victory over Catamounts

Courtesy Vermont Sports Information

HANOVER, N.H. – Brittany Wilson scored a career-high 29 points to lead the La Salle Explorers to a 68-59 victory over Vermont on the second day of the Blue Sky Classic hosted by Dartmouth College.

La Salle improves to 5-9, while Vermont closes out the non-conference slate with a 6-7 mark.

"I was disappointed with our defense and rebounding tonight. I thought we executed our offensive game plan but failed to shut down Brittany Wilson, who had a great offensive game," said Vermont head coach Lori Gear McBride.

The game opened up with four ties and three lead changes between the two teams in the first five minutes of the action. After a 3-pointer by Sam Simononis tied the game up at 14-14 with 14:26 left in the half. Alexis Scott answered with a 3-pointer for La Salle to spark a 9-0 run and push the Explorers to a 23-14 lead, their largest of the half, with 6:46 remaining.

Vermont cut the lead to three behind a 9-3 run, fueled by six points from Lauren Buschmann, with 3:29 left in the half, but the Catamounts were held without a point over the final three minutes of the stanza and La Salle went into the locker room with a 34-26 lead. Buschmann scored 15 of UVM's 26 first half points and finished the game with a team-high 21 points.

The Explorers opened the second half with a 10-3 run and extended their lead to 15, 44-29, at the 15:20 mark. La Salle's lead would grow to 20 points until the final three minutes of the contest. A trio of UVM freshmen, led by six points from Tierra Shumpert, scored the final 11 points of the game to cut the margin to nine, but it wasn't enough to complete the comeback effort.

Lauren Buschmann finished the day shooting 8-for-10 from the field and added eight rebounds. She finished the tournament with two-day totals of 34 points and 19 rebounds. Simononis chipped in a career-high 14 points and junior Kristine Lalonde added seven assists.

"Lauren Buschmann put together a supreme effort this evening, but it wasn't enough to stop La Salle from dominating," said Gear McBride.

Scott added 14 points, six rebounds and four assists for La Salle. Wilson also grabbed seven rebounds for the Explorers who dominated the boards, out rebounding UVM 45-29 in the contest.

"As we head into conference play, we will certainly take what we have learned from tonight's loss and use it to prepare for Stony Brook," continued Gear McBride.

Vermont will return to action on Monday (Jan. 2) when it hosts Stony Brook at 7 p.m. to open America East action. The game will be UVM's first on its home floor since Nov. 22. The Catamounts have been on the road for the past eight games, during which time they have visited six states and traveled over 3,900 miles.

The game will be streamed for free via CatamounTV at UVMathletics.com.