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It took 234 days, but Columbia women’s basketball got its revenge on Seton Hall, the team that came out victorious in last year’s WNIT Quarterfinal, in a 83-76 victory on Thursday night.
“I’m so proud of our team. We’ve had this game circled on our calendar for a while, since March 28,” head coach Megan Griffith said in a postgame interview. “It was just an opportunity for us to come back and battle with a really great Seton Hall program.”
Returning over 96% of the team’s points, rebounds and minutes from last year’s WNIT quarterfinal team, expectations are high for the Columbia women this season. The Lions took their initial step toward the program’s first ever NCAA Tournament bid with a 77-69 victory over Memphis at the Elma Roane Fieldhouse on Monday night.
The game was knotted at seven halfway through the opening frame, but the Tigers finished the quarter on a 11-2 run. Down eight with just over a minute to go, the Lions returned the favor and ended the half on 8-2 run to cut the deficit to two. Memphis extended the lead to four, 54-50, after three quarters.
But the game would quickly turn in Columbia’s favor.
Columbia’s three-point shooting was as cold as the snow-filled campus over the game’s first 35 minutes, but a late surge from downtown lifted the Lions to a 76-66 victory in the conference opener against Cornell.
The Light Blue (10-4, 1-0 Ivy) tried to deny the inside early against the Big Red, one of the nation’s top rebounding and two-point shooting teams. Cornell (7-6, 0-1 Ivy) foiled that plan by taking a 10-7 lead on the boards and hitting three of six shots from beyond the arc. Thanks to a strong 47% shooting effort, Columbia was able to finish the first 10 minutes with the score tied at 20.