By: A 42-16 edge in points in the paint for St. Norbert keyed a 67-44 win for the Green Knights on Tuesday evening.
Box Score DE PERE, Wis. – The visiting Illinois College women's basketball team fell behind early on and could never make up ground in a 67-44 loss to St. Norbert on Tuesday night. The Green Knights outrebounded the Lady Blues, 38-26, and held a 42-16 edge in points in the paint to help pick up the win. Illinois College dropped to 5-4 (3-2 Midwest Conference), while St. Norbert improved to 7-3 (6-0 MWC).
The trend of the game was set early on. The first 14 points of the contest all came inside of 15 feet, with St. Norbert holding a 10-4 lead before Stephanie Weigman made a jumper to increase the margin to 12-4.
Jaicie Halleman made the first of her four three-pointers in the game to shrink the St. Norbert lead to five and
Melissa Solorio scored later in the quarter to do the same, but the Green Knights tallied the last four points to take an 18-9 advantage into the second quarter.
That 4-0 run eventually became an 11-0 run as the Green Knights scored the first seven points in the second to take a 25-9 edge on the Lady Blues.
Sydney Lett finally broke the cold stretch for Illinois College, but St. Norbert scored at will inside. The Green Knights put 16 of their points on the board in the quarter down low and took a 39-20 lead into the halftime break.
Illinois College played even with St. Norbert for the first four minutes of the third quarter until an 8-0 run from the Green Knights gave them a 52-25 edge. A quick 5-0 response from IC was answered by a 7-0 run from SNC to make it 59-30 going into the final period of play.
More than five minutes went by in the fourth quarter before Lett nailed a three-pointer to get the Lady Blues on the board. Solorio followed with one of her own and
Brielle Greenleaf scored inside to cap the 8-0 run, but by that time less than three minutes remained in the game. Halleman closed out the scoring for IC with two three-pointers with time ticking down.
Lett ended with a team-high 13 points and Halleman added 12. Solorio added seven points for the Lady Blues. St. Norbert was paced by a game-high 18 points from Weigman and 15 points and a game-high eight rebounds from Mallory Nickerson.
Illinois College will return home for its final non-conference game of the season, facing Blackburn College on Dec. 30 at 7 p.m.
