The women's basketball team picked up a win this past Saturday night versus Yale, but was not able to defeat Brown Friday night in Leede Arena. Dartmouth lost a close 68-64 game to the Bears and came back to beat Yale, 65-54. The loss and win moves Dartmouth's record to 11-6 overall, 3-2 in the Ivy League.
"We started off really slowly on Friday," Coach Chris Wielgus said. "Brown is an explosive team, and an opportunistic team. They changed the momentum of the game. Brown took unbelievable shots and made them all. We had opportunities to score, but just didn't."
Brown took control from the tap, scoring the first nine points of the game, while leaving Dartmouth in its dust. The Big Green eventually began to score, but it was a difficult comeback.
Despite the offensive strengths of Bess Tortolani '98 and Jen Stamp '96, Dartmouth failed to take the lead. Tortolani scored nine points, while Stamp had seven rebounds to tie the game, 29-29 at the half.
"Brown played really well," Tortolani said. "It was obvious that we hadn't played a game in two weeks. Brown came to play, and it took us a while to get into it."
The team seemed a bit more focused in the second half, while Tortolani took control of the scoring for the Big Green. She racked in another 13 points in the second half, including four three-pointers, to give her a career high of 22 points.
"In the second half we settled down a little, and Bess did a really nice job for us," Wielgus said. "But the overall effort was disappointing. I think the athletes themselves were disappointed."
Stamp finished the game with ten points and eleven rebounds, while Erin Rewalt '99 had ten points and five rebounds. The Big Green's balanced attack against Brown improved over the course of the game, but was not enough to win.
"We were upset with ourselves," Tortolani said. "We let our coaches down, and we let ourselves down. Our coaches did everything they could, and we just didn't deliver. If we want to win the Ivies, we can't afford to drop games at home."
Saturday, however, was a different story.
"We managed to pick ourselves up on Saturday," Wielgus said. "We moved the ball better, and came out strong in first half."
Dartmouth exploded in the first half, dominating the court and mostly the boards. This time, Dartmouth scored six points to start off the game with lead.
Throughout the first half, Shoosh-star Sally Annis '97 sunk 13 points, while Tortolani added seven. The game was 41-24 at the half, with Dartmouth's field-goal percentage at 43.
"We played together against Yale," Tortolani said. "When we played Brown, we just struggled throughout the game. Things just seemed to come together on Saturday night, with the help of a great crowd, also."
Dartmouth kept the momentum up in the second half with impressive passing by Nicci Rinaldi '99, who also added seven points. Annis scored 15 points overall, and had eight rebounds.
The Big Green's loss to Brown and defeat over Yale simply shows how each Ivy League game is really up for grabs.
"With all the games, anyone can beat anyone," Weilgus said. "It's like a marathon, games go back to back, and don't stop until the end of the season.
"We're going to have to overcome a lot in order to win the Ivies," she added. "We need to continue to play hard. Most of all, we can't get overly exited about losing and overly excited about winning. One game at a time."
Next weekend the team takes to the road, playing Penn Friday night and Princeton on Saturday. Both games begin at 7 p.m.
