Women’s Basketball Rally Falls Just Short

fThe women’s basketball team may have dropped its first game when it faced George Mason on the road on Monday but the Stags showed plenty of fight, losing 70-65 after a furious comeback attempt fell just short. Fairfield fell to 3-1 while the Patriots improved to 4-2.

“We have to look to play the game on our terms,” said Frager. “I use a boxing analogy. It’s like when you’re fighting a puncher, you can’t get drawn in, you’ve got to control the fight with your jabs. We did a great job. I’m proud of how they fought back. Now we’ve got a relatively quick turnaround against a good Mount St. Mary’s team.”

The Stags kept the game close for the first part of the game, but the Patriots went on a run at the end of the first half and the beginning of the second to take a 55-32 lead with 13:13 to play. Then Fairfield buckled down and senior Stephanie Geehan took over, scoring 13 of her career-high 33 points. Sophomore Desiree Pina also added six of her nine points in those final minutes. But it wouldn’t be enough as the team cut the lead to three and couldn’t get any closer.

Geehan also put up her second double-double of the year with 17 rebounds in the game as well.  She leads the team in points and rebounds per game with 16.8 and 11.3 respectively as well as in blocks with nine and steals with eight in four games. The senior forward’s numbers rank first in the MAAC in rebounding, third in scoring and tenth in assists. Defensively she is first in blocked shots and tied for seventh in steals.

“She played phenomenal,” said head coach Joe Frager. “In the second half, we ran a play, where she stepped out and banged a three. I turned to my assistants and said, ‘That’s a senior play right there.’ She let everyone know we’ve still got some basketball to play today.”

The Stags also had to play a few players in different positions after starting sophomore point guard Sarah Paulus went down with an injury five minutes into the game. After the game, Frager was not sure of the severity of the injury, which occurred while she was bringing the ball up the court, but he did think it was enough of concern to hold her out of the game.

Pina then had to play all forty minutes and shot three of 20 from the floor after scoring 22 points with six assists in the Stags’ previous game against St. Francis. Pina is also Fairfield’s second leading scorer averaging 15.8 points per game. The Stags as a team shot 35.5 percent and Geehan scored over half the Stags’ points.

“We’re not quite there yet,” said Frager. “At times it is, but you have to give George Mason a lot of credit. They’re so quick and athletic that you think faster and react more than you want to. That can lead to what appears to be sloppy execution. A lot of times we had players open on cuts, but we were being pressured so hard, we were a little rattled.”

But the Stags did show resolve in competing to get back into the game after being down by 23 points with only a little over a quarter of the game left against a bigger, more athletic George Mason team.  Some starters were injured or in foul trouble, but still the Stags battled back from being down more than 20 to chip away and almost steal a non-conference road win.

“I think anytime you lose a game, you find something to build on,” said Frager. “I said in the locker room after the game, we learned we can overcome some adversity and we have it in us to respond. But we also learned that we can’t spot a team that many points in the first half. I’ve said before, we’re a work in progress. We’ll have our moments, and we’ll have our trying moments. But I really enjoy coaching this team.”

Freshman Katelyn Linney was also honored for the second time this season as the MAAC Rookie of the Week. She is the Stags’ third leading scorer averaging 9.8 points per game and against St. Francis she had four assists and five rebounds to earn the award.

The women’s basketball team will look to rebound from is first loss against Mount St. Mary’s (3-3 overall) in the Stags’ Arena at Harbor Yard opening game on Thursday at 6 p.m. The game is a double-header and the men’s basketball team will face Marist at 8 p.m.