Violets defeated by Bears in last minutes of game

The NYU women's basketball team battled on the court for 40 minutes, but eventually fell during the second half to Washington University in St. Louis, 58-50, Sunday afternoon on Senior Day at Coles Sports Center.

Before the game, NYU honored its four graduating players, seniors Grace Carmen, Jen Hum-Traverso and Hailey Kimball, and junior Emily Foshag.

Carmen, playing in her final regular season home game, led the Violets in scoring with 11. Junior Chelsea Blake also added 10 points and a team-high seven rebounds off the bench.

In the first half, it looked as though the Violets might be able to upset Washington. The Violets held the Bears to just 13 points in the game's first 17 minutes and were able to build a six point lead. Even though Washington ended the first half with seven unanswered points, the Violets went into the locker room trailing only 20-19.

"We knew if we were going to stay in the game, it would have to be a low scoring first half," Hum-Traverso said. "That became our agenda the entire game."

But NYU struggled to capitalize on the offensive end all afternoon. The Violets missed four layups in the first four minutes of the second half as the Bears extended their lead to nine. The Washington lead eventually ballooned to 14 after two free throws by Kathryn Berger with 6:36 left to play. Berger led all scorers with 15 points.

But the Violets would not go away. NYU cut its deficit to seven on three occasions in the game's final two minutes and forced the Bears to make their free throws in order to ice the game.

Even though the Violets came up short, head coach Stefano Trompeo was proud of his team's effort.

"They fought from minute one to minute forty," Trompeo said. "Many other teams would just fold up."

The determination that NYU showed on Sunday came just two days after one of its poorest late-game performances of the year. Last Friday night in a home game against the University of Chicago, the Violets cut a 17-point second half deficit to six with 6:57 left, but then allowed the Maroons to score 12 points in a row en route to a painful 73-52 loss.

"We put up a tremendous fight, we just couldn't hold them," Carmen said after the loss to Chicago. "In the end we were playing as five individuals and not five members of a team."

Despite dropping two in a row, NYU remains in contention for postseason play. The Violets will look to strengthen their case for a high seed in the ECAC Metro Tournament when they return to the court Friday night against Emory University for a 6 p.m. game in Atlanta.