XML Box Score Grantham, PA - Messiah College raced out to a 19-5 lead against Arcadia University on Saturday and led all the way to earn the Commmonwealth victory, 58-42.
Taylor Miller scored 11 points to tally exactly 1,000 in her career, becoming the 19th player in program history to accomplish the feat. Katelynn Vanderhoff also scored 11 points and added five steals while
Gillian Glackin scored 10 points and grabbed six rebounds.
Sienna Wisse scored eight points and grabbed a team-high nine rebounds.
"This was a great team effort and a really solid win," head coach
Mike Miller said. "We came out with a lot of energy and set the tone early on. Our defensive pressure seemed to really get to them [Arcadia] and we capitalized."
Both teams had a difficult time finding the bottom of the net in the opening minutes of play. After six shots and almost three minutes of play,
Chelsea Danel found
Sienna Wisse under the basket for a layup that broke the scoring drought. The Knights also fired six shots before scoring their first points, but it took them more than five minutes to do so.Â
After Dominique Hassinger put the Knights on the board, the Falcons' defense went to work. With less than 15 minutes to play, the Falcons switched into a 2-3 zone defense which seemed to rattle the Knights. For the next five minutes of play Arcadia took only four shots, allowing the Falcons to capitalize and post 10 unanswered points. It wasn't until almost nine minutes in that the Knights increased their point total by a single free throw.
Messiah's defensive pressure continued through the rest of the half, forcing the Knights to turn the ball over 16 times.Â
"It wasn't our plan to use the 2-3 zone as long as we did, but it worked so we stuck with it," Miller said. "Kate[lynn] [Vanderhoff] was a big factor for us on defense today. She anticipates really well and came up with three steals in the first half."
The Falcons' defense held the Knights to 19 shots and only 10 points in the first half – their lowest points against in a single half this season. Despite shooting only 30.3% (10 of 33) from the field, Messiah netted 27 first half points (60% from three and 4-of-7 for free throws) to carry a 17 point lead into the half.
At the beginning of the half, hope was still alive for the Knights as they scored six unanswered points to draw within 11, but the Falcons responded with back-to-back jumpers from
Taylor Miller to extending their lead to 15 (31-16). Vanderhoff gave the Falcons their largest advantage (21 points) at both the 11:58 and 9:50 marks, en route to an 11 point night, yet the most significant bucket would come just five minutes later.
With 5:57 to play,
Taylor Miller drove the lane and laid the ball up toward the basket. The ball rolled around the rim once, then twice, and on its third rotation fell through the hoop, giving Miller her 999
th and 1000
th career points and the 50-30 lead. Miller finished the night with 11 points.
The Falcons posted only eight more points to the Knights' 12 before the final buzzer sounded, but the night belonged to Miller and the win went to the Falcons.
"This is a very special group of young ladies," Miller said. "They've got a lot of fight and determination in them, which leads to improvement. It was a great night for Taylor but an even greater night for the team."
With the win Messiah moved to 9-6 overall and 5-3 in the Commonwealth. Arcadia falls to 8-7 (2-6). The Falcons look for another Commonwealth win next Wednesday when they travel to Widener University (10-5, 5-3). The game is set to begin at 6 p.m.
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