Topé Obajolu scored 12 points and added five rebounds against the harks [Corey Johns-TRW]

With seven seconds left in the game, down by three, the women’s basketball got the ball into Carlee Cassidy’s hand and with just one second remaining Cassidy raised up in attempts to tie the game and send the conference opener against Hartford into overtime, but the shot just did not fall, hit the far side of the rim, and bounced out as the buzzer sounded, handing UMBC a 69-66 loss in their conference opener for the Hartford Hawks.

Even in a loss coach Phil Stern was focusing on the positives as his team cut a 16-point first half Hartford lead to keep the game within six points during a back and fourth second half which the lead changed 10 times.

“I don’t like to lose but it was really a great basketball game,” he said. “We played well and woke up after 10 minutes and played one of our best games of the season.

For the majority of the first half UMBC looked to be on the wrong end of a blowout as Hartford jumped out to a 16 point lead in just 13 minutes, but as Stern said, the team woke up and cut that lead to seven by intermission, and took the lead five minutes into the second half.

In the comeback Cassidy scored her 1,400th point but also put the team on her back as she scored a game high 21 points off a 7-15 performance from the field, including a 3-8 performance from three-point range and a 4-5 performance from the free throw line. She also recorded a team high six rebounds and two steals.

“Carlee hit some shots which was really huge in our comeback and when that happened we just ran a better offense in the second half and had a good post battle,” Stern said.

For the majority of the season Cassidy was in an invisible slump. She was scoring a lot of points but was taking way too many shots to get them and that was really hurting the team’s performance. Her poor play was enough for Stern to decide to bench one of the most prolific scorers in America East history for a game, but since that move against West Virginia she has really turned her reason around and limited her shots but has been just as productive offensively.

“She’s a scorer,” Stern said. “She’s going to have good night and nights were she takes a lot of shots that don’t go down. But now she’s taking better shots. Rather than going six for 25 she’s going seven for 15.”

Carlee Cassidy hit three three’s in a 21 point performance against the Hawks. He game-tying shot with one second left just missed as the buzzer sounded. [Corey Johns-TRW]

While Cassidy was doing her part on the outside, the real battle was inside with Topé Obajolu going against all-conference center Diana Delva, and all-conference forward Erica Beverly. Obajolu was averaging just 5.2 points and 3.3 rebounds per game but played the best game of her career as she scored 12 points off a 3-5 performance from the field and perfect 6-6 performance from the charity stripe.

“If she’s consistent she can be one of the best post players in the conference,” Stern said, “but right now she’s only a sophomore and is still learning to play with her back to the basket.”

Stern also praised Chrissy Robinson’s performance on defense against Delva and Beverly.

With the two teams being polar opposites, as Hartford is built around a strong post game and UMBC is more of a guard-oriented team, Stern wanted to control the tempo of the game by doing everything he could to limit Delva and Beverly.

“We gave them a little bit of everything on defense,” he explained. “We played man-to-man, 3-2 zone and 2-3. They knew what to expect because we play them the same way every time. We double teamed their forwards and dared them to shoot from outside.”

The plan did work. Hartford shot just 38.9% from the field an 28% from three point range while UMBC shot 48% from the field and 37.5% from three-point range.

But in the end the slow start was too much for UMBC to overcome. In the first half they turned the ball over 12 times, which Hartford scored 19 points off of. If UMBC can avoid a slow start they showed they can certainly be a very competitive team in the America East.