 "Photo: Onnie Koski/Photography Editor")
Syracuse 54
Rutgers 64
SYRACUSE, N.Y. - It was a nail-biter of a game.
Upwards of 35 minutes of it was played tightly and evenly, with neither team having the necessary edge to pull away.
It ended in dramatic fashion, coming down to a one-minute whirlwind of scoring, proving to be the difference.
Problem is, it shouldn't have been that way at all.
The Rutgers women's basketball team took on the Syracuse Orange for the second time this season, hoping to torch through the unranked opponent in the middle of a six-day stretch consisting of perhaps two of the biggest games in its regular season: Connecticut and Notre Dame rematches.
The Scarlet Knights learned last night that once is an accident, but twice is a cause for concern, as they experienced déjà vu of the worst kind in the first half.
Rutgers eventually went on to defeat SU for the second time in 10 days by a score of 64-54, in a game that was just a little too close for comfort.
"We were slow, we were late, and for whatever reason somebody's gotta get hit in the head for us to realize that Syracuse is a smart team," Rutgers head coach C. Vivian Stringer said. "We don't play them with the attention we should."
In the team' first matchup this year, the Knights opened slow and very much out of character. Rutgers was a horrid 0-for-11 from three-point range in the opening stanza, while on the other end Syracuse freshman Jessica Richter was relentlessly draining threes on the Knights defense.
A combination of that and the absence of senior guard and leader Chelsea Newton made for a very disconcerting 20-19 Rutgers lead at the half.
Fast forward to last night's game, in which the Knights appeared to have found a way to hold off the Orange early, with RU controlling and SU merely reacting.
But at the mid-way point in the first, the score was 17-12, and it didn't get any more comfortable for Rutgers. Richter brought the same dominating offensive presence as she did in the first game, collecting 14 first half points including two big three-pointers.
"Jess comes up big in big games," Syracuse head coach Keith Ceplickie said. "Her off-the-ball play was great. She has great energy. We just let her play."
The Knights appeared to be overcompensating for the slow start of the last game by forcing shots and failing to slow down the offensive flow when the game called for it.
They didn't have a single basket off a fast break, something the team has become known for, and they committed ten first-half turnovers, five of those belonging to the usually controlled Matee Ajavon. That is the most individual turnovers committed in the Big East this season.
"Matee wasn't her normal self," Stringer said. "She was not in form."
Fortunately, Cappie Pondexter came up big for the Knights in the first, matching Richter's scoring tally with 14, a hair shy of half the team's total. The first half came to a close with the score locked at 31 and neither team owning any recognizable edge - very much like last time.
The second half was only three minutes old when Syracuse used two Richter free throws to take the lead back as their own, 35-33 at that point. From then on, the second half became a teeter-totter of control. In all, the contest saw nine ties and five lead changes.
The Knights shot 44-percent in the second, compared to 35-percent for Syracuse.
The biggest component in SU's game was Richter's stellar 21-point effort, besting her previous season high by three. The game extended Richter's streak of scoring double digits in every game played against a ranked opponent.
On the Knights end, forward Rebecca Richman had a career game, totaling eight points, 10 boards, and two steals.
"No one from our inside showed up today," Stringer said. "Rebecca is the only one that played."
The Knights appeared to be in trouble and fading late in the second half, as Pondexter and Michelle Campbell each had four fouls and the Orange kept finding ways to knot the score.
But the Knights again found a way to hold them off, preventing SU from scoring in the final 3:11. RU went on a 10-0 run to close out the contest, including a clutch Pondexter three-pointer and a Campbell bucket in the waning seconds, sealing the ten-point victory for the now 19-5 Knights.
"Cappie's great under pressure," Campbell said of the All-American's late-game heroics. "That's the type of person she is, and we have faith in her."
The Knights are now 5-0 when Pondexter leads the scoring, and her 25-point performance secured her ninth straight double-digits game.
Though it might not have come easy, the Knights extended their winning streak to four games and six-of-seven, they now look to get revenge on another Big East opponent, taking on Notre Dame at home on Saturday.
"We've just got to go back to the tapes," Pondexter said. "We've got a big one coming up in three days."
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