No. 14 Concordia Women’s Basketball Survives Late Rally
by Jacy Johnston
The No. 14 Concordia women’s basketball team held on through a nail biter with tough defense on Saturday, Feb. 13 to complete a 71-70 victory over the Northwestern Red Raiders.
Senior Becky Mueller lead the team with two early free throws to extend the Bulldog lead to 6-2 over Northwestern. These points pushed Mueller over 1,000 career points. Mueller and freshman Quinn Wragge worked to keep the offense plugging for the Bulldogs. However, the Red Raiders stuck with it and at the end of the first quarter, Concordia led 23-21.
Concordia ramped up the defense in the second quarter as sophomore Brenleigh Daum created a turnover and transition bucket to extend the lead to 33-27 halfway through the second quarter. With momentum on their side, the Bulldogs outscored the Red Raiders 17-8 in in the second quarter to create a 40-29 lead.
Mueller and Wragge repeated their offensive performances from the first quarter and continued to increase the lead over Northwestern. Midway through the period, the Bulldogs had a double-digit lead. At the end of the third, Concordia led 59-47.
The 10-point spread continued throughout the beginning of the fourth quarter. The Red Raiders flipped the momentum and slowly began shaving away at the deficit. With under a minute to play, the Bulldogs led by four points. The Red Raiders closed the gap to two points and maintained possession to shoot a last second layup that went in and out of the hoop.
Wragge led the Bulldogs with 23 points, and Mueller tallied another 17 points.
The Bulldogs moved to a record of 21-7 and 13-7 in the GPAC. Concordia is tied with three other teams for second place in the conference standings.
The final home game for the Concordia women’s team will be at 7 p.m. on Wednesday, Feb. 17 against the College of Saint Mary. To wrap up the regular season, the Bulldogs will travel to Briar Cliff on Feb. 20 to play a 2 p.m. game.
