FORT VALLEY, Ga. (December 16, 2021) – The Spring Hill College (SHC) women's basketball team earned a thrilling 70-66 Southern Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (SIAC) road victory over the Fort Valley State University (FVSU) Wildcats in overtime on Thursday evening at HPE Arena.
The Wildcats (3-5, 2-2 SIAC East) took an early 9-5 lead just four minutes into the contest and maintained an 18-13 advantage heading into the 2
nd quarter.
At halftime, FVSU held a slim 33-31 advantage after the Badgers benefited from two made technical foul shots following a Wildcats baseline infraction on an SHC inbounds play with 6 seconds showing. Spring Hill then cashed in again via a full court pass on the subsequent inbounds play that resulted in a fast-break jumper from
Tyashia Bostick as the clock expired.
A 16-4 run by the Badgers to close the 3
rd quarter put SHC in front 50-45 at the start of the final period, but three successful free throws in two trips down the court by FVSU sliced the lead down to 50-48. The Wildcats tied the game 50-50 at 8:09 off a jumper by Amiya Allen, but a free throw by senior
Carrington Matias, who was back after a prolonged year-and-a-half absence due to injury, handed the lead back to SHC at 7:58.
The Wildcats used a jump shot from Jah'ne Brown and a layup from Allen to retake the advantage at 54-51 with 6:44 left, but
Zariel Jordan dropped in a jumper to keep SHC within one possession at 6:31. Bostick's 18
th point came off a jump shot at 5:16 as the Badgers once again wrested back the lead.
Bostick made the front end of a 2-shot free throw and
Paige Taylor came up with a rebound and put-back of the back-end miss to stake the Badgers to a 58-54 cushion with 4:06 left in the game.
Free throws from both teams made it 59-57 in favor of SHC at 1:59, but FVSU tied the game with a put-back bucket of a missed 3-pointer from left side to knot the game at 59-59 with just 54 seconds on the clock.
Valley would block two last-second Badger attempts to win the game in regulation time – once on a long jumper with 2 seconds left and again under the basket as the horn sounded.
One minute into overtime, Torri Myers put FVSU ahead 61-59 with two free throws,
Ariel Thompson made one-of-two on the other end to keep SHC within one at 61-60. Thompson came up with a big tie-up steal off a Valley missed jumper and converted it into a layup at 2:42 to hand SHC back the lead. Thompson drained another free throw at 2:14, but Ja'Nya Ferguson of the Wildcats made one of her own at 1:51. Bostick then found an inside layup to make it a 65-62 Badger lead with 1:01 to play. Ferguson would sink two free throws at the 41-second mark, leading to a Badger timeout.
Out of the timeout,
Mathilde Nicolas of SHC drew a foul and converted both freebies with 31 seconds to go. Nicholas then came down with a crucial rebound of a Valley miss and Bostick made it count with 1-of-2 free throws at 18 seconds. Two Valley free throws by Nyah Dismukes made it a 68-66 Badger lead, but a
Brandy Lee layup for SHC at 13 seconds was followed by a FVSU turnover to salt away the contest for the visitors, 70-66.
Bostick had a game-high 22 points to pace the Badgers while Lee added 14 points. Bostick and Nicolas each had seven rebounds. SHC shot 46.3% (25-54) from the floor and 38.5 % (5-13) from 3-point distance, but made just 53.6% (15-28) of their free throws. Spring Hill lost 32 turnovers to 19 steals by the Wildcats.
FVSU shot just 29.7% (22-74) from the field and 25% (2-8) from long distance while making 60.6% (20-33) of their shots from the charity stripe. The Wildcats won the rebounding war 55-36, but lost 30 turnovers to 17 Badger steals. Myers led Valley with 14 points and a game-high 13 rebounds before fouling out with 2:14 left in overtime.
Winners of three of their last five games, the Badgers (3-7, 1-2 SIAC West) next play at 2 p.m. (east) Saturday at the Clark Atlanta University (CAU) Panthers (2-9, 2-1 SIAC East) at L.S. Epps Gymnasium in Atlanta.
