Women’s basketball season recap; Hawks finish second in SUNYAC

NEW PALTZ, NY- The SUNY New Paltz women’s basketball team finished the season with a 17-8 overall record and was 13-3 in the State University of New York Athletic Conference (SUNYAC) which was good for second place.  The Hawks handed Cortland it’s only loss in the conference.  The Hawks competed against six teams that earned or were invited to the NCAA Division III Basketball Championship.  New York University made it to the Sweet 16 and Stevens, Cortland, Baruch and Kean all won their first round games.  The sixth team, Brockport, was the only team not to make it out of the first round. 

The Hawks opened the season on the road against fourth nationally ranked Kean November 19.  The Hawks were without their second leading scorer from a season ago Kristen Caban due to injury.  The Hawks were not able to get anything going offensively and fell to Kean 78-55. 

The Hawks would return home for the first annual SUNY New Paltz Tip-Off Classic.  The Hawks opened with Wheaton College and defeated the Lyons 69-62 behind the solid play from junior forward Carly Minehan with a game-high 23 points and eight rebounds.  The Hawks would go onto the championship game against William Smith and defeat the Herons in triple overtime 95-91.  Junior point guard Nicole Sarcone dished out seven assists in both victories.

The Hawks would have a two game home stand against SUNY IT and New York University.  The Hawks would defeat the Wildcats 73-60.  A week late the Hawks would host 2009 Sweet 16 Finalist New York University.  The Hawks would fall behind NYU early by as much as 18 in the first half and went into the half down 15.  The second half the Hawks fell behind by 18 once again, but used a 14-0 run over four minutes to cut the lead to four points.  NYU would stretch their lead back to 18 only to see the Hawks cut the lead to five, but the Violets would hold off the Hawks for the 97-89 victory. 

After the game in an interview with Coach Jamie Seward, he said “We competed strongly in a very high level college basketball game.  It isn’t often you see a score like that in a Division III women’s game.  Unfortunately, we dug ourselves too deep a hole when Nicole went out (13-0 NYU run with Nicole Sarcone out of the game for three minutes in the first half).  Nevertheless, to fight back and give ourselves a chance after having fallen behind that much against one of the better teams in the country definitely showed this team’s heart and courage.” 

The Hawks would open conference play against Morrisville State on the road and would return home for that weekend for two more against Fredonia and Buffalo State.  The Hawks would dominate the Mustangs 82-29, shooting 46 percent from the field.  In the Fredonia game, the Hawks would take an eight point lead into the half, but would come out and dominate the second half on their way to the 86-64 victory.  The next night the Hawks had a poor shooting night, but their defense stepped up and forced 30 turnovers and held the Bengals to 27 percent shooting.  Freshman guard Caitlin Irwin scored a career and game-high 23 points and made seven from behind the arc.  This was the final game for the Hawks for the semester as they took a 6-2 record and 3-0 in conference into the break.

The Hawks would return after break to host Norwich and defeated the Cadets 57-52, forcing 30 turnovers in the win.  The next night, the Hawks would travel to New Jersey to take on Stevens Institute of Technology, who earned a spot in the 2009 NCAA Championship and lost to NYU in the second round.  The Hawks jumped out early, but fell behind by seven at the half and the Ducks hot shooting carried them to the 90-75 victory.

The Hawks returned home for a two game home stand against conference opponents Morrisville State and Geneseo.  The Hawks overwhelmed the Mustangs hold them to four first half points and 13 for the game as the Hawks won 76-13.  The Hawks held Morrisville to 11 percent shooting and forced 46 turnovers.  The next night, the Hawks continued their pressure defense as they beat Geneseo 76-48, holding them to 30 percent shooting and forced 42 turnovers.  The Hawks now stood at 9-3 overall and 5-0 in the conference.

The Hawks next four games were on the road against conference opponents starting in Potsdam.  The Hawks jumped out quick to start the game on a 13-2 run, but the Bears were able to battle back to tie the game at 27-27 at the half.  The Hawks trailed a total of 19 second the entire game and won 65-59.  The next afternoon, the Hawks had Plattsburgh, which end up being the Hawks first conference loss of the season.  The Hawks would hold a narrow margin at the half, 34-33, but the Cardinals would control the second half, as the Hawks could not get anything going and fell to Plattsburgh 72-65.  The Hawks would rebound from the loss to beat Geneseo 61-47.  The Hawks would finish their road trip against SUNYAC Tournament Champion Brockport.  The Hawks and the Golden Eagles would go into the half tied at 36-36.  The teams would battle each other in the second half, but the Golden Eagles would take a slight advantage and would hold on for the 67-61 win.

The Hawks returned home to meet their rival and SUNYAC regular season champion Cortland in a show down between the top two teams in the SUNYAC.  Cortland came into the game at 15-2 overall and 8-0 in the conference, the Hawks were 11-5 overall and 7-2 in the conference. 

The Red Dragons controlled play in the first half as they led the whole way. At the 14:50 mark in the first half, Cortland held an 8-6 advantage and went on a run of 22-10 over the next 10:15 to take a 30-16 lead.  The final 4:35 of the half, the Hawks battled their way back into the game with a 17-4 run to close out the half and only trail 34-33 at the break.  The second half, the teams could not pull away from each other as no team would have a lead bigger than four points until the Hawks broke open the game with 4:55 remaining.  The Hawks trailed at that point 53-49 and used a 17-5 run to take control of the game and hold off Cortland 67-64 for the victory.

Coach Jamie Seward had this to say about the Cortland game at the end of the year “To be the only team to defeat Cortland in SUNYAC play makes a statement as to where our program has come over the last couple of years, but to do it the way we did says that much more.  It was not only overcoming a double-digit deficit, but the way our kids never blinked after falling behind is what speaks most tellingly about the character of our team and our players.  Then, to pull away late in a close game is very gratifying because we spend so much time working on late game situations, so it is nice to see that hard work pays dividends in such a big game.”

Three days later, the Hawks had another tough game against conference foe Oneonta which was going to help the Hawks maintain pace with the Red Dragons from Cortland, but also help the Hawks pull one game further away from third place Oneonta.  Oneonta came into the game with a 9-2 conference record and the Hawks were 8-2.  In a hard fought first half, the Hawks would hold a slight advantage at 27-25 at the break.  The second half the Hawks would never trail the Red Dragons and would control the tempo of the game for the 60-50 victory. 

The Hawks next four games would be on the road against Baruch, Oswego, Buffalo State and a rematch with Oneonta.  This would conclude the Hawks road schedule for the year.  The Hawks would fall to NCAA Tournament team Baruch 78-63 and would force 11 turnovers on the Monique Salmon, the nations assist leader.  The Oswego game, Caitlin Irwin hit a three-pointer with three seconds left to force overtime and the Hawks would hold off Oswego 71-65 in overtime.  Then they would sweep the weekend with a victory over Buffalo State, where they had a six point advantage at the half and would dominate the second half, outscoring the Bengals by 18 for the 71-47 win.  They would finish their road schedule against Oneonta.  The Hawks would fall to Oneonta 61-50 and would struggle from the floor for the game.

They would finish the regular season with Potsdam and a rematch with Plattsburgh, who handed the Hawks their first conference loss of the season.  In the Potsdam game, the Hawks fell behind early and was down 37-28 at the half.  The second half, the Hawks stormed out with a 21-6 run to open the first ten minutes of the half and take a 49-45 advantage.  The Hawks would push their lead to seven with 1:16 remaining, but would hold off the Bears for the 66-63 victory.  The next day the Hawks had their rematch with the Cardinals from Plattsburgh and revenge the loss a month earlier.  The Cardinals jumped out early to a 10-2 lead, but the Hawks wasted no time and out scored the Cardinals 44-20 the last 17 minutes of the half.  The Hawks would cruise to the easy 76-55 win.  The Hawks finished the season at 17-7 overall and second place in the SUNYAC with a 13-3 record.

The Hawks would host Potsdam in the first round of the SUNYAC Tournament.  The Hawks, who have defeated the Bears by nine points combined in two games, was looking to defeat the Bears for a third time this season.  Potsdam quickly jumped out to a 19-5 lead and would go into the break with a 32-21 lead.  The Hawks would continue to cut into the lead and used a 24-9 run to take a 54-49 lead with 7:41 remaining in the game.  The Bears would slowly chip away at the lead and take a one point advantage with 1:01 remaining.  With four seconds remaining and Potsdam up 62-61, Maureen Curley missed the front end of a one-and-one and Chelsea Clarke rebound ball and passed to Maggie Farrell who found Nicole Sarcone wide open for the three-point shot.  Sarcone hit the shot at the buzzer, but the referees waved off the basket and the Hawks would lose in a heartbreaker to Potsdam.  “It was a tough way to end our season.  Give Potsdam credit, but you have to give our players credit as well.  They fought back as they have done all year long and that shows the heart and character our kids possess.  I am very proud to coach such a courageous team” says Coach Jamie Seward

The Hawks as a team and individuals set new school records with this 17-8 overall record and 13-3 in SUNYAC play.  The Hawks won 13 games in the conference for the first time in history.  The team ranked 15th in the nation with 13.1 steals per game and 47th in three-point field goal defense at 26.7 percent.  The Hawks forced 26.2 turnovers per game and was first in the conference and 20th in the nation in turnover margin. 

Junior forward Carly Minehan moved into ninth all-time with 19 blocks in a season, ninth all-time in career rebounds with 407 and 15th all-time in points with 562.  Coach Seward said, “Carly was our most consistent player this year and exceeded the high expectations set after a tremendous freshman year in 2006-07.”

Junior guard Maggie Farrell moved into 13th all-time on the schools scoring list with 602 points, 12th all-time in rebounds with 385 and ninth all-time with a 125 steals.  Coach Seward said, “Maggie was good as any player in the conference the last 15 games and it was due to her dedication she put in during the summer and pre-season.  We expect Maggie to be among the SUNYAC elite players next year as a senior.”

Junior point guard Nicole Sarcone had 143 assists this season which was good for fourth all-time in a season and is second all-time on the career assists list with 342.  She needs 15 assists to break the all-time record of 357.  She is also sixth all-time with 171 steals in her career.  Sarcone finished the season 14th in the nation with 5.7 assists per game and was 29th in assist/turnover ratio with 1.83.  “Nicole completed another stellar year and I am already anxious to see her play next year.  I am very confident that there is still another level that she will ascend to both as a player and a leader” says Coach Seward.

“Our freshmen class showed great signs of promise but, for the most part, they never played consistently enough to help us get to that next level.”  Caitlin Irwin was pressed into a much larger role than anticipated with the season-ending injury to Kristen Caban.  She started 21 games, finished third in minutes played, third in scoring and led the team in three point field goals made.  “Caitlin Irwin had a strong first year, but she hit that freshman wall towards the end of the season.  However, with an invaluable year of experience and a summer of diligent work, we will be expecting big things from her, and I believe that you will see a better-rounded player next season.” 

Katie Clifford also saw significant time as a freshman, playing over 20 minutes per game and averaging over ten points per game over the last five games of the season.  “Katie was quite impressive for a freshman point guard.  She showed poise and presence beyond her age and experience that really speaks to her confidence level as a player and as a person.  Katie has the potential to be as good as any point guard I have ever coached, and that is saying a lot because we have an awfully good one right now in Nicole Sarcone.  Katie is also highly competitive and has a very strong work ethic, so it will be interesting to see just how good Katie will be next year.” 

The rest of the freshmen class all showed flashes of brilliance but also demonstrated the typical freshmen trait of inconsistency.  “Every one of the other five freshmen (Zoe Cohen, Stefanie Mignone, Kathleen Folkl, Sam DelGaudio, and Bridget Grover) has the ability to be a really good player and big-time contributor to our team, and they all showed that at some point over the course of the season.  I am really interested to see who puts in the necessary work over the off-season and comes back next fall as a better and more confident player ready to play with much more consistency.”