Volume 115 >> Issue 4 : Friday, February 17, 1995

Women's Hoops Falls to 10-9 after Loss to Babson

Sharon N. Young Pong--The Tech
C.J. Doane '95 scores against Babson College on Tuesday evening. MIT lost 46-81.

By Thomas Kettler
Staff Reporter

The Babson College Beavers destroyed the MIT women's basketball team by a score of 81-46 Tuesday night at Rockwell Cage. The conference loss made the team 10-9 overall and 1-5 in the New England Women's Eight Conference for the season.

Babson controlled the tip off and scored on a Michelle Merten field goal just eight seconds into the game. MIT answered by scoring the next four points with Sarah Davis '97 providing the only Engineer lead of the game in the next 30 seconds.

After the Davis field goal, Babson answered with 16�5 run over the next six minutes to take an 18�7 lead. During the run, the Beavers made several transition baskets off of missed MIT field goals. Merten was very effective at this in getting most of her 20 first half points in transition.

A scary moment occurred with 6 minutes, 53 seconds left in the half with Babson leading 26�13 when the Beavers' Shelley Grant fell to the floor with an ankle injury. She would not play again for the night and left the court at halftime on crutches after needing to be helped off the court.

After the injury, C.J. Doane '95 scored the next seven points to cut the lead to 26�20 with 5:29 to play. Davis made one free throw with five minutes left to get MIT within five at 26�21. However, the Engineers never came closer as the Beavers scored the next nine points to get the lead back to 14 at 35�21 with 2:30 left.

An MIT field goal cut the lead to 12 before Babson scored the next eight points to lead 43�23 with 20 seconds left in the half. Two free throws by Kristin Ratliff '95 with 11 seconds remaining resulted in the halftime score of 43�25.

The second half continued in the same manner as the first with the Beavers having a 20�4 run in the first seven minutes to give Babson an insurmountable 34-point lead at 63�29. The Engineers would come no closer than 30, with the Beavers having their largest lead at 35 when the game ended at 81�46.

Babson beat MIT on the floor. Overall, the Beavers sank 49 percent of their field goal attempts, while the Engineers only scored on 26 percent of their shots.

Individually, Merten scored 22 points to lead both teams. Two other Babson players scored in double figures. The Engineers had two players in double figures, with Doane leading with 19, while Davis added 10. Ratliff led the team in rebounds with nine.

Commenting on Merten's performance, MIT head coach Suzan Rowe said, "That's why Michelle is player of the year in the NEW-8 for the past three years."