The Lady Maple Leafs’ basketball team showed a strong defensive front as time expired to beat conference rival Taylor University at home last Saturday. The final score of 64-62 reflected the game’s intensity that lead to the women’s first conference victory.
The women started off well, taking an early lead quickly in the first period of the game. The lady Trojans played an aggressive game, coming close to taking the lead, but not succeeding to tie the game only about 8 minutes remained in the first period, when the score stood at 20-20. After about a minute Taylor was able to take the lead, pulling ahead by 5 points within minutes of the lead change. The Trojans held on strong to finish the half with a seven point lead and a score of 34-27.The second half started off rough for the Maple Leafs, who were playing well but weren’t quite able to catch up to Taylor on the scoreboard. Goshen came close to tying up the score many times but were unable to take the lead until the last minutes of the game. With only a minute and a half left of play time in the game, Goshen took the lead thanks to a score by junior Kari Heusinkveld, leaving the score at 60-59. The lady Trojans fought back hard tying up the game, but with only 12 second left the Maple Leafs were able to pull away as a result of two free throw shots by senior Erica Yost, setting up the final score of 64-62.
Lindsay Gangloff, a senior, led the Leafs with 17 points and two assists. Erica Yost and Cassie Greives, both seniors, added 15 and 14 points respectively.
This was the women’s first conference victory and the win puts the Leafs at 5-16 on the season and 1-6 in conference play. Next, the Lady Leafs will travel to Michigan on Saturday, Jan. 22 to play Spring Arbor University.
