Brock women battle Windsor in playoffs
Madalyn Weinert had 23 points and 11 rebounds as the Brock Badgers women’s basketball team concluded the Ontario University Athletics regular season with a 67-62 victory Saturday night over the Toronto Metropolitan Rams.
The Badgers led 18-13 after one quarter but trailed 36-35 and 50-46 in the second and third quarters before rallying for the win in the final 10 minutes.
Also contributing to the victory were: Kaley DeMont with 11 points and six boards; Olivia Fiorucci and Theresa Brown with seven points; and, Madison MacInnis with six points and nine rebounds.
Brock finished the regular season with a 12-10 record while the Rams ended up 14-8.
Last Friday, Brock concluded the home portion of its schedule with a 67-53 loss to the Rams.
The visitors built quarter leads of 14-11, 38-25 and 53-35 to record the victory.
Leading the way for Brock in the game were: Weinert with nine points; Fiorucci with eight points and eight rebounds; and, DeMont with eight points.
“It was one good (game) and one bad,” Brock head coach Mike Rao said. “I don’t know if we played any worse or better on Saturday but we made some shots and I think that was the difference.”
He is pleased to finish the season with a record above .500 in a rebuilding year.
“It is better than I expected so I am happy from that perspective,” he said. “Obviously we got better but now that it is playoffs, we have a hill to climb.”
Brock moves on to play at Windsor Wednesday at 7 p.m. in first-round playoff action. Windsor beat Brock 63-46 Feb. 10 on the way to a 12-10 record.
“We have an uphill battle but hopefully we can come out and just play hard,” Rao said. “There are no big secrets. If we play hard and if we make a few shots, we can stay in some games. The games that we lost, we had some good shots but we weren’t capable of making them and we had a few too many turnovers.”
The regular season loss to Windsor followed that script.
“We didn’t make anything, we missed a lot of layups, we had too many turnovers, we fouled too often, and we never got in the groove.”
The Lancers will be a handful for the Badgers.
“They are big and they are going to pound it inside and that is going to give us some issues,” he said. “Obviously, we are going to protect the paint a little better which means we are going to give up a little bit more on the perimeter.”
It is a matter of picking your poison and hoping for the best.
“They have their shooters too and if their shooters get off we could still have the same issues. Last time, they score inside/out on us and they had everything going,” Rao said. “When we protected the paint, they hit some threes. When we went on the perimeter, they went inside. They are a good team. I think we can stop one but we need some help with the other.”
