COLLEGEVILLE, Pa. – The Haverford College women's basketball team had its program-record nine game winning streak snapped by host Ursinus on Thursday evening, falling to the Bears by a final score of 62-55 at Hellferich Hall. The contest featured eight ties and 14 lead changes.
Haverford was paced by Samantha Wetzel, who narrowly missed a career-high with 20 points and added 10 rebounds for her sixth double-double of the season. Sierra Berkel added 14 points and nine rebounds points while Macy Goldbach poured in 10 points for the visitors. Haverford falls to 13-5 (10-3 Centennial Conference) with the loss while Ursinus improves to 9-10 overall (7-7 Centennial Conference) in victory.
The first quarter of action saw the two squads deadlocked, with neither team taking a lead of more than a possession at any point. Kaci McNeave gave Ursinus a 10-7 lead with 2:49 to play in the first quarter and after a Goldbach jumper cut the lead to 10-9, Toni Suler hit a layup for a three point lead at 12-9. Sierra Berkel converted a pair of free throws to give the Fords a 13-12 lead with 27 seconds left in the quarter.
The second quarter was similar to the first, with both squads trading baskets in the early goings. After Wetzel finished a layup to give Haverford a 15-12 advantage, McNeave responded with back-to-back three pointers to push the Ursinus lead to three with 8:07 left.
Rachel Guy gave the Bears a 24-21 advantage before Wetzel cut the lead to 24-23 with a layup at 4:07 remaining in the first half. Libby Lannon gave Ursinus its last lead of the half at 1:01 remaining but Katie Cook beat the buzzer to send Haverford to a 29-28 advantage at the half.
McNeave paced all scorers with 14 in the first half while Wetzel had 12 for the Fords. Ursinus used a 54.5 percent shooting effort in the second quarter to keep things close.
The third quarter started on a 4-0 run for the Fords as Wetzel and Berkel each hit layups prompting a Bears timeout. After a Suler jumper, Wetzel drove for a layup to restore the Fords' lead to five at 35-30. The lead extended to six with a Goldbach trey with 3:29 left in the quarter. The six point advantage represented Haverford's largest lead of the contest. A 6-0 run Ursinus run tied the score at 40-40 before Anna-Sophia Capizzi buried a three-pointer with 14 seconds left for a 43-40 lead for Haverford.
In the fourth, the teams swapped leads with the eighth tie of the game occurring at 51-51. A McNeave jumper allowed Ursinus to pull ahead 53-51 and after a Haverford turnover, Lannon hit a pair from the charity stripe for a 55-51 Ursinus lead. With 33 seconds remaining in regulation, Capizzi hit a three-pointer to cut the Ursinus lead back to two, but after a fruitless Haverford possession, the Bears hit five of their last six from the free throw line to take a seven point win.
Freshman Megan Furch had a career-high three blocks for the Fords while Berkel added a career-best four assists. Each team missed just one free-throw with the Fords shooting 91.7 percent from the line.
Ursinus also got the best of the Fords in the conference opener for both teams in November, sweeping the season series from the Centennial Conference leaders. McNeave (18), Lannon (13) and Guy (12) all scored in double figures for the Bears.
Haverford will return to action at Gooding '84 Arena on Saturday afternoon against Dickinson. The matchup is slated to begin at 1:00 p.m. and will be followed by the Haverford men hosting the Red Devils at 3:00 p.m.