By Tim Glon

BEREA — The Ohio Northern women's basketball team clinched at least a share of the Ohio Athletic Conference Regular Season title with a 63-52 victory at Baldwin Wallace Wednesday night at Ursprung Gymnasium.

The Polar Bears (19-5 overall, 15-2 OAC) now have a 1-game lead in the OAC over John Carroll (14-3) with just one game to play.

The Yellow Jackets fall into third place in the OAC with the loss and are 18-6, 13-4.

ONU can clinch the No. 1 seed and home court advantage throughout next week's OAC Tournament with a victory in its regular season finale on Saturday against Marietta on Senior Day at 3 pm at the ONU Sports Center.

Regardless of that outcome against MC, Northern will receive a double-bye and will host a semifinal game on Thursday night at 7:30 pm at the ONU Sports Center.

Senior Jordan Kimes had game-highs of 18 points and eight rebounds and junior Karissa Steffas had 11 points and a game-high eight boards to lead ONU.

Junior Carly Thomas added 10 points for the Polar Bears.

Ohio Northern used a stifling defense in the first half, limiting BW to just 4-of-29 shooting, and led 25-11 at halftime.

After the hosts scored the first five points, ONU rattled off a 16-0 run, en route to a 25-3 run, and led 25-8 with 2:41 left in the half.

The lead grew to 19 points on two occasions, as a layup by Kimes made it 41-22 with 11:44 remaining in the game.

The Yellow Jackets would make a run and climb within 55-47 with 1:56 to go, but ONU scored on four of its final five possessions to put the game away.

BW was led by Sydney Clark with 15 points and Janaya Feaster with 11 points.

The Polar Bears made 25-of-46 field goal attempts for 54.3 percent, while limiting the Yellow Jackets to 18-of-59 shooting for 30.5 percent.

ONU out-rebounded BW 41-26.