BROOKLINE, Mass. – The Newbury College women's basketball team fell to Wheelock College, 66-60 in overtime, in New England Collegiate Conference (NECC) action, on a snowy Saturday afternoon. Junior guard Brianna Hochwarter (Attleboro, Mass.) led three Wildcats in double figures with 18 points en route to their 12th victory of the season.
Newbury came out of the gate with a strong front court presence. First year forward Savannah Olsen (Battle Creek, Mich.) and sophomore forward Destiny Spears (Arnold, Md.) combined to score 11 of the team's 21 points as the Nighthawks led the Wildcats by six, 21-15 after the first quarter.
However, the momentum shifted as the Wildcats opened the second quarter with a 6-1 run. Junior guard Emily Doyle (Lynn, Mass.) drained a trey two minutes in the period to cap off the run and pull Wheelock to within one point of the lead, 22-21. Spears answered and trained a trey three minutes later to put the Nighthawks back up by two scores.
With under two minutes remaining in the half, Hochwarter connected with sophomore guardEmma Siver (Colchester, Vt.) at the perimeter for three. In the process, the Vermont native was fouled on the play and converted the abnormal four-point play, knocking down a free throw to pull within one point of the lead, 27-26. First year forward Sarah Tobin (Salisbury, Mass.) gave the Wildcats their first lead of the game knocking down a pair of free throws with nine ticks on the clock as they went in to the break with the 30-28 lead.
When the teams emerged from the locker room at the start of the second half, the third quarter mirrored the second favoring the Wildcats as they outscored the Nighthawks, 14-9 to take a seven-point, 44-37 lead. But the winds quickly shifted in the final seven minutes of regulation.
After senior guard Katelyn Roeser (Nashua, N.H.) drained a trey to bring the Nighthawks back to within two points, first year guard Tylar Barbato (Hillsdale, N.Y.) turned the game around. Barbato picked the pocket of Wildcat junior forward Kayla Corshia (Medway, Mass.) and brought back down court for the lay-up to tie up the contest at 46.
Roeser knocked down a pair from the charity stripe seconds later to take the two-point lead but the Wildcats answered with a 6-1 run to lead by three, 52-49, with just over a minute left in regulation.
Barbato said no, recording her second steal of the quarter, picking the pocket of junior guardJaime Grzych (Columbia, Conn.) with 47 seconds remaining on the clock. Seconds later she found Olsen, who drained the mid-range jumper and converted the three-point play to send the game to overtime.
Gryzch opened up the overtime period with three-pointer, igniting a 7-0 Wildcat run. The Connecticut native had five of Wheelock's seven points in the stretch as they never looked back.
Olsen led all scorers netting a career single-game high 24 points while Barbato came off the Nighthawk bench following up with nine points. Spears was two points shy of a double-double tallying eight points and 10 rebounds.
Newbury falls to 4-12 and 3-6 in conference play while Wheelock improves to 12-3 and 8-1 in the NECC. The Nighthawks return to the hard-court on Tuesday January 26th when they host Southern Vermont College at 7:00 p.m. The Wildcats will also be in action Tuesday evening when they go on the road to Weston, Mass. for a 7:00 p.m. tilt with Regis College.