Women earn split in weekend blowouts

The women's basketball team played in two blowouts last weekend, unfortunately for them, they only came out on the winning end once. On Saturday, the Jumbos demolished Trinity College 80-43 to bump their NESCAC record over .500 (3-2). The victory in Hartford, CT followed an embarrassed 63-40 loss to Amherst the night before.

The Trinity Bantams presented no challenge for Tufts. Whether it was frustration from the Amherst loss boiling over or just a gigantic difference in talent, the Jumbos took it to the Bantams. Nine of ten players on the Jumbos' roster scored and of those nine, six scored in double figures.

"It was a really good team win," senior captain Hillary Dunn said. "Every person contributed. We really needed a big game like that after Friday night's loss."

Sophomore guard Erin Connolly had a team high 14 points with four assists and five steals. Junior guard Maritsa Christoudias had 12 points and four steals. Three other Jumbos had 11 points.

While Trinity only had six more turnovers than Tufts, defense was the name of the game for the Jumbos, as they had nine more steals and 19 more rebounds than the Bantams.

"The defense was what we wanted to concentrate on," freshman Jessica Powers said. "It really sparked our offense. We wanted to get in passing lanes and not let them set up their offense and box out."

The Jumbos had a 13-point halftime lead, but in a show of dominance over their opponents, Tufts outscored Trinity by 24 in the second half. Although Trinity is winless in the NESCAC at 0-6, the victory was important because it puts the team in the right frame of mind for upcoming games against conference foes Bowdoin and Colby on Friday and Saturday respectively.

"We really weren't on top of our game at Amherst," Powers said. "Trinity was really important because we wanted to bounce back and play our game. To come back after a loss like that is really important for us."

The Amherst game was a completely different story. Instead of the Jumbos controlling the game as they did against Trinity, Amherst _ previously been winless in the NESCAC at 0-4 _ subjugated Tufts. Amherst's overall record is now 10-7 (1-4 NESCAC), and demonstrated its ability to run with quality NESCAC opponents such as Tufts.

"I think we are a better team, so we really didn't expect that," Powers said. "They didn't miss. It was their night, it wasn't ours."

The Lord Jeffs' did not accomplish the feat of knocking off the number eight team in New England themselves. They got plenty of help from the Jumbos who shot a horrid 17.2 percent from the field. Tufts did not even score a point for the first 5:23 of the contest and did not convert a field goal until junior center Erin Buckley made a layup eight minutes into the game.

Luckily for the Jumbos, Amherst was not playing too hot either. The Lord Jeffs missed 15 of their first 17 shots, but still held an 8-4 lead midway through the first half. From that point, the Jeffs scored at such a torrid pace that the Tufts squad was left with a 19 point halftime deficit.

"We definitely were not going to give up," Powers said. "We could totally have come back from 19. That was the spirit in the locker room. We have to pick it up in the second and could still come out with a win."

The Jumbos were not able to pull out a victory, but were only outscored 24-20 in the second half.

"We picked up our intensity a lot more," Powers said. "That was one thing that was missing in the first half."

Because of the nature of both the Trinity and Amherst games, everybody on the team got to play substantial minutes in the two league games.

"We only have 11 people on our team," Dunn said. "We play a lot of people. It was important because we got everybody experience against NESCAC competition."

The Jumbos next game is this Tuesday night at 7 p.m. against Lasell. The Lasers will enter Cousens Gymnasium with a 6-10 overall record. Lasell only averages 53.2 points per game and should find it hard to compete with the Jumbos who average 69.4 points per game.

"Whatever their record is, we can't look past any team when preparing for Tuesday," Dunn said. "But we also have a really big weekend coming up [with games against Bowdoin and Colby]. Hopefully we can use the Lasell game to continue what we did against Trinity in terms of getting everybody into the games, executing our plays and getting back to the way we were playing against Bates."