Why do it the easy way when the hard way is so much more exciting?
After squandering a 16-point first-half lead Wednesday against Brown University, the Boston University women’s basketball team went on an 18-3 tear during the second half to glide to a 73-59 win in Providence, R.I.
The win was the fifth straight for the Terriers, who open the season at 5-1 for the first time since 2001. The loss drops Brown’s record to 3-4.
Sophomore Cheri Raffo led the team in scoring by collecting a career-best 19 points. Sophomore forward Kasey Devine added 11 points, 10 rebounds and four steals. Katie Meinhardt, starting for the first time after coming off the bench in the last three games, chipped in with 13 points.
“It was a bit of an ugly game,” said BU coach Kelly Greenberg. “A lot of things didn’t go our way, but we stuck it out and it was a great team effort.”
The Terriers got off to a quick start, jumping to an early 11-2 lead, but turnovers on four consecutive possessions gave the Black Bears a chance to get back in the game. After Brown scored five straight points to trim the lead to four, senior captain Rachael Vanderwal made the three-point play to give the Terriers a 14-7 lead.
From there, the Terriers exploded, making shots and taking advantage of the Brown Bears’ mistakes. Two beyond-the-arc shots by Raffo and layups by Devine and Erica Kovach gave the Terriers a 24-10 lead. Brown went more than six minutes without making a field goal.
Yet, the Terriers could not put the game away. Plagued by turnovers and missed shots, BU would suffer its own scoring drought. Three consecutive 3-pointers by Brown guards would cut the Terriers’ lead to 26-19. And the Brown Bears kept battling back, narrowing BU’s lead to 33-31 at the break.
“I told them that we needed to shut down their 3s,” Greenberg said. “We allowed them six 3s in the first half and none in the second half. It wasn’t a high-scoring game, so we needed to step it up defensively. I told them that we needed to control the things that we can control.”
The Terriers’ leading scorers – Vanderwal, Meinhardt and Kovach – combined for 10 points in the first half. On the way to her best scoring day at BU, Raffo piled on 15 points in the first half.
“She came out in the very beginning and was just on fire,” Greenberg said. “She scored 15 points in the first half and we needed every one of them. She had seven rebounds, too. She just had an all-around great game.”
The Bears would continue to climb after the break, taking advantage after a missed shot by Vanderwal to tie the game on free throws by Sarah Hayes. Two consecutive shots for the Bears would put Brown up, 40-38, giving BU its first deficit of the game.
A three-pointer by Raffo, her fourth of the game, would cut the Bears’ lead to one. Raffo went 1-for-2 from the free throw line shortly after to tie the game at 40. The Terriers followed a 3-pointer by Kovach with a three-point play by Vanderwal to give BU a six-point lead.
From there, the Terriers didn’t look back, leading by as many as 16 points. A 3-point shot by Corinne Jean with just over three minutes remaining put an end to any hopes of a Brown Bear comeback.
The Terriers continue their stretch of eight straight games on the road this weekend when they head to the RCA Dome to take on the University of Indiana.