By Gabriel Rodrigues
This weekend, Laurentian’s women’s basketball team kicked off their home-opener with two straight losses.
On Friday, Nov. 8, the Voyageurs started their home season campaign with a 59-34 loss to the McMaster Marauders.
In the first quarter, McMaster started the game off strong with two straight three point shots, which forced Laurentian to take an early timeout.
However, the Marauders continued where they left off managing to score 15 straight points before the Voyageurs finally put in their first basket of the game.
McMaster would take a 22-6 lead going into the second quarter, as Laurentian could not catch a break missing easy layups and turning the ball over.
The Voyageurs began the second quarter with a little more confidence scoring the first two baskets and tightening it up on defensive with key rebounds.
Although Laurentian missed some chances, the Voyageurs still managed to score nine points in the quarter leaving their counterpart with only seven with the first half ending with McMaster leading 29-15.
The third quarter wasn’t to kind to the Voyageurs, as a series of turnovers allowed the Marauders to score 16 points to Laurentian’s four.
In the fourth, Laurentian scored 15 points beating McMaster in the quarter, but it was too little too late for the Voyageurs, as they lost the game by 25 points.
“We were lacking confidence all game,” said Laurentian head coach Jason Hurley. “Our attention to our defensive zone needs to improve and our offense lacks control, but it’s up to the players to figure it out. It takes time to get used to a new system, so I get that, as long as they put the work in and play hard, and I felt like we did that for certain parts of the game.”
The Voyageurs had 28 turnovers and shot only 18.4 per cent from the field (9-49) compared to the Marauders 32.7 per cent (18-55).
McMaster guard Danielle Boiago led all players scoring 19 points going three for seven in three point attempts and four for six behind the free-throw line.
Third year player, Danielle Harris, led Laurentian with nine points and four rebounds in the Voyageurs’ second loss of the season.
On Saturday, Nov. 9, Laurentian hosted the Brock Badgers losing 63-48, as the Voyageurs drop their third straight game in a row moving their record to 1-3 on the season.
In the first, Brock controlled the play, but the Voyageurs kept clawing their way back and managed to score 12 points, finding themselves only down by one to the Badgers at the end of the quarter.
However, in the second quarter, Laurentian only scored four points compared to Brock’s 18, as the Badgers took a 31-16 lead going into halftime.
Voyageurs began the third with a couple of fast baskets forcing the Badgers to play some defense, but Brock found a way to hit timely shots throughout the quarter taking a comfortable 48-28 lead going into the fourth.
Although the Badgers 20-point lead seemed to be out of reach, Laurentian showed a lot of promise during the last quarter scoring and finishing much of their opportunities outscoring the Badgers 20-15.
“It’s a process,” said Hurley. “We played a great second half, and if you look at it, it was just one bad quarter. Plus, I felt the team was a little intimidated and scared, but when they started to play, it’s a nice brand of basketball because we took charges, hit threes and got offensive boards.”
Brock forward Nicole Rosenkranz led all players with 15 points, eight rebounds and two assists.
Laurentian guard Adrienne Moreau managed to score 14 points and 11 rebounds throughout the game, as the Voyageurs out-rebounded the Badgers 42-28.
The Voyageurs had 30 turnovers compared to the Badgers eight, making ball control an issue for Laurentian, all in all, Hurley said he’s pleased with his teams’ performance throughout the weekend because “they are playing hard no matter the score.”
“There were nerves,” said Hurley. “We battled hard, but we were scared because if you look at it, we played the seventh and eleventh ranked teams, so it was tough for us. We just need to learn from this and improve in the next game.”
Laurentian forward, Devenae Bryce, said her team needs to play with more confidence.
“We need to trust in each other,” she said. “We started off really well, especially after losing bad last night, we just weren’t clicking offensively, but our fourth quarter was unreal and I was really proud of us for that. Unfortunately, it wasn’t enough.”
The Voyageurs are home again this upcoming weekend, as they play host to the Guelph Gryphons on Friday, Nov. 15, and the Lakehead Thunderwolves on Saturday, Nov. 16 with both games beginning at 6 p.m. at the Ben F. Avery Gymnasium.