Furious rally by women's basketball not enough in ACAA Title Game loss to Finlandia

Sunday, March 1

Bloechl Center

12 pm

UC Santa Cruz Athletics

14-12

Finlandia

14-11

Team	1	2	3	4	F
Finlandia	17	26	9	8	60
UC Santa Cruz	8	14	9	19	50

Furious rally by women's basketball not enough in ACAA Title Game loss to Finlandia

3/1/2020 12:00:00 AM | Women's Basketball

Box Score

MILWAUKEE, WI (3-1) - UC Santa Cruz battled back and held Finlandia without a field goal in the fourth quarter, but an early hole undid the Banana Slugs in a 60-50 loss in the ACAA Conference Title game.

UCSC finishes the year 14-12.

The Banana Slugs hit just one field goal in the game's first six minutes. With center Kaylee Murphy on the bench with early foul trouble, the Lions closed the quarter on a 7-3 run to lead 17-8 after ten minutes.

Finlandia then outscored UCSC 13-2 over the first 4:30 of the second quarter to push their lead to twenty points at 30-10, and they led by as much as 23 when Taylor Perile's layup made it 43-20 before two free-throws from Kowack in the last :03 made it a 43-22 halftime deficit, the second-largest halftime the Banana Slugs have faced this year.

The third quarter stayed in Finlandia's favor with both teams scoring 9 points to leave it a 21-point game heading into the final quarter.

That's when the Banana Slugs caught on fire. Emily Mitchell, Murphy and Ashley Kowack all hit threes as UCSC opened on a 9-1 run to make it 53-40 and force a Finlandia timeout with 4:48 left. Mitchell hit back to back layups to cut the deficit to 53-44. A couple of stops by the Slugs led to a Murphy layup that got UCSC within 53-46 with 2:48 left. The teams then got into a free-throw contest, with the Lions' Carsyn Osterman hitting three in a row to make it a 10-point lead again. Kowack then hit 1-2 free-throws and stole the ball on the next possession, leading to a Mitchell transition three that made it 56-50 with 90 seconds left. However, the Banana Slugs couldn't convert another shot and were forced to foul down the stretch. Osterman then hit four consecutive free-throws in the last 0:47 to give the final margin and the Conference title to Finlandia.

Kowack led the Banana Slugs with 19 points with Mitchell adding 15. Katie Lundeen had 17 to lead the Lions (14-11) and Osterman finished with 15, including 9-10 from the line. Overall, Finlandia was 23-29 (79.3%) on free throws compared to UCSC being 13-17 (76.5%).

ALL-TOURNAMENT TEAM
Erika Williams, Mount Mary
Kierra Jackson, Pine Manor
Kaylee Murphy, UC Santa Cruz
Katie Lundeen, Finlandia
MVP - Carsyn Osterman, Finlandia