MARIETTA, Ohio — The Marietta College women's basketball team saw its furious comeback fall short as a last second shot from
Amisha Herd (Zanesville, Ohio/West Muskingum) was off the mark allowing Otterbein University to escape with a 73-72 win Wednesday (Jan. 25) evening in Ban Johnson Arena.
The Pioneers slip to 10-8 overall and 4-7 in the Ohio Athletic Conference. Otterbein improves to 8-10 on the season and 4-7 in conference play.
Marietta trailed by 12 points, 71-59, with 5:33 left in the game. The Pioneers erupted for 13 straight points to grab a one-point lead, 72-71, with 44 seconds remaining on the clock.
Herd triggered the run with a pair of free throws.
Alexis Enochs (Beverly, Ohio/Fort Frye) scored on a layup followed by a jumper and two free throws from
Brooke Borich (Beverly, Ohio/Fort Frye).
Shay Lett (Chillicothe, Ohio/Chillicothe) drained a three-pointer to get the Pioneers within one, 71-70, and then Borich sank two more from the charity stripe giving MC the lead.
Otterbein missed a jumper on its next possession but Kiersten Taylor grabbed the offensive rebound and laid it in with 14 seconds left giving the Cardinals the lead back.
Pioneers head coach
Kole Vivian called a timeout advancing the ball to midcourt. Marietta called a second timeout with six seconds left to set up the final play. MC inbounded the ball to Herd who drove the lane and floated a shot that hit the iron and bounced out as the buzzer sounded.
Borich led the Pioneers with 22 points. Herd and
Corrie Burkhardt (Zanesville, Ohio/Philo) each scored 11 points, while Enochs chipped in with 10 points. Burkhardt notched a double-double with a game-high 14 rebounds.
Taylor led all scorers with 32 points including 14-of-17 from the line. She also pulled down a team-best eight rebounds. Dani Kissel scored 15 points and Ali Cartnal finished with 10 points.
For the game, Marietta shot 39.0% (23-of-59) from the floor, 28.6% (6-of-21) from three-point range and 80.0% (20-of-25) at the free throw line. Otterbein was 24-of-56 (42.9%) from the floor, 4-of-11 (36.4%) behind the arc and 21-of-26 (80.8%) at the line.
The Cardinals outrebounded Marietta, 40-32. The Pioneers committed 11 turnovers while Otterbein turned the ball over 15 times.
Marietta travels to Berea on Saturday (Jan. 28) for a 3 p.m. game at Baldwin Wallace University. Fans can follow all the Pioneer teams all year long at
pioneers.marietta.edu. You can also follow the Pioneers on Facebook at
facebook.com/MariettaCollege and @MariettaPioneer on Twitter and Instagram.
