The SVSU women’s basketball team found its first wins of the season against Lake Superior State and Ferris State last week to improve to 2-8 on the season and 2-2 in GLIAC play.
The Lady Cardinals survived a three-point barrage from LSSU (0-8) to take their first win of the season, 64-52, on Thursday, Dec. 7.
The Lakers shot 9-15 from beyond the arc, 7-11 in the first half. The Cardinals answered at the free-throw line, as they made 16 of 28 tries.
SVSU led at halftime by a one-point margin, 28-27. The game was tied after three quarters, as the Lakers outscored the Cardinals 17-16 in the period.
SVSU’s offense came alive in the fourth quarter, as they outscored LSSU 20-8.
A layup by redshirt freshman Laurel Jacqmain gave the Cards an eight-point lead, their biggest of the game, with seven minutes left to play.
As a unit, SVSU outrebounded LSSU 45-34, including 15-4 in the fourth quarter. The team also had 10 steals.
The team was led on offense by junior Abby Duffy and Jacqmain.
Jacqmain scored a career-high 16 points. The guard finished the game with eight rebounds and two assists.
Duffy added 16 of her own, as she shot 8-15 from the field. The forward added seven boards and three steals to her game résumé.
Junior guard Anna Hall had six assists to pair with her eight rebounds and two steals.
Junior guard Hannah Settingsgaard scored more than 10 points for the second game in a row. Settingsgaard shot 7-11 from the charity stripe while adding three steals on defense.
Freshman guard Rozhane Wells provided quality minutes off the bench. She had two points but made the most out of her 20 minutes, as she had four assists and four rebounds.
Freshman forward Kaitlyn Geers led the bench in scoring with seven points in 11 minutes.
Head coach Jamie Pewinski applauded the team’s fourth quarter performance behind Hall’s control of the game.
“We played with a lot of purpose and discipline in the fourth quarter, and we let the other team make the mistakes when it mattered,” Pewinski said. “Laurel and Abby reaped a lot of the benefits of Anna pushing tempo and controlling the pace in the fourth quarter. … Now that they’ve all done it on the same night, they know it can happen.”
The Ferris State Bulldogs (6-4) came to O’Neill Arena on Saturday, Dec. 9, where the Cardinals won a close one, 77-72.
The team excelled on both sides of the court, as they shot 46 percent from the field and recorded 13 steals.
Duffy led all players with a career-high 21 points on 10-13 shooting. She also grabbed six rebounds.
The Cardinals had three starters record three or more steals.
Jacqmain and Hall tallied three steals and Settingsgaard had four. Settingsgaard is third in the GLIAC with 2.7 steals per game.
Jacqmain recorded her first career double-double as she scored in double digits for the sixth time in seven games. She finished with 13 points and 10 rebounds.
In addition to her three steals, Hall scored nine points on 4-7 shooting and had a season-high seven assists.
Geers had quality minutes off the bench, as she scored eight points in a season-high 30 minutes of play. She also grabbed three boards and had two assists.
The Cardinals trailed the entire first half, as they went into the locker room down 36-33.
Their first lead came with under seven minutes to go in the third quarter. Jacqmain made two free-throws to put the team up two.
The teams traded the lead a handful of times before SVSU put a multiple possession difference between them and FSU.
The Lady Cardinals concluded the game by outscoring the Bulldogs 20-11 in the fourth quarter.
This week, the Cardinals travel to Northwood for their final game before winter break on Saturday, Dec. 16, for a 6 p.m. tip-off.
The team returns from break and will host Lewis on Saturday, Dec. 30, at 1 p.m.
