Correction Appended
The women's basketball team won back-to-back games at home this weekend, beating Columbia University on Friday, 63-51, before defeating Cornell University on Saturday, 59-51. The wins marked the Big Green's first weekend sweep since 2009, the same year the team won the Ivy League championship.
Dartmouth (7-16, 3-6 Ivy) again played without two of its starters forward Brittney Smith '11 and point guard Nicola Zimmer '14 due to injuries, leaving only nine players for the weekend's games.
"It's tough losing your point guard but a lot of the younger players have definitely stepped up," Faziah Steen '13 said. "It's a challenge but I think we've definitely handled it well."
Head coach Chris Wielgus said she was impressed by the Big Green's effort.
"This is an outstandingly resilient group," she said. "We had inexperienced people in there, we lost arguably the best player in the [League] who had already been named the best player in the [League] in the past. We also lost arguably the best rookie in the League."
Although Dartmouth leads Columbia (5-19, 4-6 Ivy) by a large margin in the teams' overall series, Columbia had beaten Dartmouth in their past three meetings.
The Big Green shot 40 percent from the field while limiting the Lions' shooting to 23.7 percent. Dartmouth also outrebounded Columbia, 44-39. Dartmouth played relatively poorly in the first half against Cornell (5-19, 2-8 Ivy) on Saturday, shooting only 26.9 percent. The Big Green entered halftime down by eight points.
"We couldn't close out at first and we had a lot of miscommunications," Steen said.
Dartmouth settled in the second half, however, and was able to storm back and take the game.
"Offensively we got into a flow in the second half," Steen said. "Once we talked [the communication errors] through we were able to make more shots."
Rebounding, rather than shooting, turned out to be the key to the game. Cornell was able to outrebound Dartmouth in the first half, 27-20. Dartmouth turned up the intensity in the second half, however, grabbing 25 rebounds and ceding only 13 to the Big Red.
"We missed easy shots and we didn't box out [in the first half]," Wielgus said. "They didn't get those second chances in the second half."
Wielgus said she was pleased by the team's determination.
"You can see our effort in the defensive end," she said. "They outrebounded us the first half but we definitely outrebounded them in the second half."
After consecutive road losses last week, the Big Green wanted to redeem itself and added intensity to its pre-game practices, Steen said.
"These are big games for us," she said. "After our losses last week, we definitely wanted to come in and play hard and try to execute the best way we can. The team is beginning to settle in."
One of Dartmouth's biggest weaknesses is its inexperience, according to Wielgus. "We are just out-hustling, out-working and out-playing," Wielgus said. "We've been there [shooting inconsistently] and this time we played it through. That's what the youngsters have to learn you just have to fight your way through. We have a lot of kids who never played in these situations before and it's a learning experience."
The Big Green will next play against Yale University on Friday at 7 p.m. before playing Brown University on Saturday at 7 p.m.
