WOMEN’S BASKETBALL

The Forester women’s basketball team kicked off their season in impressive fashion Thursday night at the Schaefer Center by picking off #24 Indiana Tech 73-72 compliments of Celeste Ryman’s buzzer-beating three.

The finish was one for the books. While Ryman’s game-winner was undeniably the play of the game, the final :35 seconds were action-packed as both teams were perfect down the stretch. After Dazia Drake knocked down a pair of freebies to force the game’s sixth tie at 68-68 with 35 ticks remaining, Kyra Whitaker, Tech’s top returning scorer, snaked her way through the lane for a layup to put her team up by two 19 seconds later.

A timeout by HU gave Konnor Gambrell the opportunity to post up down low. The 6-0 forward didn’t disappoint as she muscled her way on the block for two of her 15 points for a 70-70 draw with :06 seconds to go.

Little did anyone suspect there was still plenty of basketball to be played as junior transfer Juliana Burris got an acrobatic layup to fall for another Tech two-point advantage. With 2.7 seconds remaining and the ball at halfcourt, Ryman received the inbounds pass on the wing, took one dribble and let it fly at the buzzer. The rest, as they say, was history as her triple hit nothing but the bottom of the net for the one-point HU victory.

The 5-4 senior guard finished with eight points and took two charges.

Emily Seboe paced the Foresters with 19 points by going 7-for-10 from the floor and a perfect 4-for-4 from the line. She also collected five boards, a steal and an assist. In addition to racking up 15 points, Gambrell pulled down eight rebounds. Between the two of them, the pair accounted for half of HU’s 26 rebounds.

Alli Vaughn rounded out Huntington’s double-digit scoring with 13 points which included draining two long balls in the first quarter. Drake handed out a game-best six assists to go along with seven points.

It was opening day for both teams and while first-game jitters played a role early on, the first ten minutes proved the highest scoring quarter of the contest with Huntington pulling ahead by as many as seven before Tech took a slight 22-19 advantage into the second stanza. The hosts proceeded to build a 30-21 lead, the largest disparity of the night, by the 7:17 mark of the second quarter but the Foresters didn’t panic.

Instead their response was back-to-back threes by Logan Rowles and Seboe as part of an 8-2 run that got them right back in it at 32-29 with five minutes left in the half. While the Warriors cushioned their lead to seven at 41-34 by intermission, HU kept their composure even when their deficit ballooned back to nine to start the third quarter.

Huntington’s grit and persistence paid off as they eventually reclaimed a lead of 60-59 with just under six minutes remaining. It was their first advantage since the 2:23 mark of the first quarter. The gap between the two teams never ventured beyond two points after that with HU having the final say.

While the Foresters entered the contest having lost their last two outings against the Warriors, they have owned the series 10-6 since 2005 which includes a 79-77 overtime win in 2019 when the Warriors were ranked #4 in the nation.

Tonight’s epic win will go down as Coach Darby Maggard’s first collegiate win as a head coach.

“I am incredibly proud of the effort and resilience that our girls showed tonight,” said the first-year head coach. “Tech is a great program, and we knew it was going to take 40 minutes of effort.

“I’m pleased with the way we never let our effort drop even when Tech made runs. Overall, we’ve got a lot of work to do in cleaning things up and continuing to improve, but I am so proud of these girls for the way they competed tonight.”

Burris finished with 24 points to lead all scorers. Tech (0-1) also got 14 points from Erika Foy and 11 from Whitaker.

The Foresters (1-0) are back in action on Saturday when they host Holy Cross at 1:00 p.m.