Too often this season, the Navy women’s basketball team hasn’t been able to make enough plays down the stretch to pull out close games.
That wasn’t the case Wednesday night in Annapolis, and an uplifting result provided coach Tim Taylor with an encouraging sign that his young, inexperienced team is growing up and learning how to win.
Sophomore center Kate Samson scored the go-ahead basket with 2.6 seconds remaining then played solid defense to deny the potential game-winning shot on the last possession as Navy upset Loyola Maryland, 53-51, at Alumni Hall.
Sophomore guard Toni Papahronis scored the tying basket with 41 seconds left then grabbed a big defensive rebound on the other end for the Midshipmen, who secured their most significant victory of the Patriot League campaign to date.
“I definitely think they’re growing up. We made a lot of winning plays tonight,” Taylor said. “We’ve always had confidence because we’ve been in games with everybody. Wins like this add another layer of confidence.”
Freshman guard Kyah Smith was aggressive taking the ball to the basket throughout in scoring 17 points and also dished off six assists to lead Navy (10-15, 6-8), which overcame a three-point deficit over the final minute and a half. Samson posted a double-double with 12 points and 10 rebounds for the Mids, who scored 23 points off 21 turnovers by the Greyhounds.
Freshman guard Kimmie Hicks came off the bench to score 14 points to lead Loyola (13-12, 8-6), which came into the contest tied for first place in the Patriot League and riding a four-game winning streak. Graduate student forward Ava Therien netted 11 points for the Hounds, who are now in a three-way tie for second.
“That was a much-needed win. I think we played a really good game overall. I’m really glad we pulled it out and beat a really good team,” said Smith, who drove the ball downhill and wound up going 4-for-4 from the free throw line as a result.
“I think in previous games I was settling for too many jump shots, so the biggest thing was to get to the rim.”
Freshman guard Zanai Barnett-Gay had 10 points and three steals for Navy, which is tied with Bucknell for ninth place in the 10-team league. At present, the Mids would win the tiebreaker by virtue of having beaten the Bison in late January.
Navy is vastly improved, evidenced by the fact it has picked up four of its six conference victories since Jan. 31. The Midshipmen are trying to avoid playing in one of two first-round games of the Patriot League Tournament.
“We know we can play with any team in the league and could easily be No. 1. I think we can win the whole thing,” Smith said. “It’s just a matter of whether or not we’re going to play our best basketball.”
Indeed, this season’s two meetings between Navy and Loyola shows there is not much difference between the top and bottom of the Patriot League standings.
The Midshipmen played the Greyhounds virtually even for the better part of 80 minutes during the two contests and could easily have swept the regular-season series.
In the first matchup between the teams at Reitz Arena, Navy led for more than 35 minutes before Loyola used a late comeback to pull out a 70-67 victory. The Mids fell victim to a frantic full-court press as the Greyhounds forced four turnovers and allowed only four made baskets over the final five minutes to erase a seven-point deficit in the fourth quarter.
“What a season it is for the Patriot League. The parity is really fun,” Loyola coach Danielle O’Banion said. “Sometimes it’s fun in a good way and other times, like tonight, it’s fun in a bad way.”
Standout junior forward Lexi Therien totaled eight points and 11 rebounds for Loyola but sat out almost the entire fourth quarter because she had four personal fouls. The Greyhounds made just 3 of 12 field goal attempts in the final frame and Taylor cited the Midshipmen’s ability to get stops as the key to pulling out the close contest.
“A lot of it came down to the fact we defended. Over the last six or seven games, when we defend, we win. If we can hold teams to less than 60 points, we usually win. I certainly thought we defended well tonight,” Taylor said.
Navy employed a full-court trapping press to disrupt Loyola, which spent valuable time getting the ball upcourt. O’Banion acknowledged the tactic worked as it forced the Greyhounds to rush their offensive sets.
“It made us uncomfortable for sure. We were operating with a shorter shot clock,” the third-year coach said. “Navy did a great job defensively and found some things that worked for them offensively. At the end of the day, it was a game of moments and I thought we had some moments that we missed that we would like to get back.”
Samson made two free throws with 1:23 to go to cut the deficit to 51-49. On the ensuing possession, a bad pass along the baseline by Kelly Ratigan was picked off by Smith.
Navy ran a play to get the ball to the 6-foot-4 Samson, who had a decided height advantage in the post. Samson missed a short turnaround, but Papahronis grabbed the offensive rebound and made an acrobatic layup to tie the score at 51.
“We wanted to go inside to Kate because we had an advantage. She missed the shot and Toni came flying in and grabbed the rebound, got a step through and made the shot,” Taylor said. “That was huge because if you miss that one then they’re going to run 30 more seconds off the clock and it really changes things. Once it’s a tie game you have a different mindset.”
Ratigan badly missed a jumper from the wing and Papahronis snagged the rebound. Taylor called a 30-second timeout to set up a play and once again went inside to Samson, who made a shot in the paint to give Navy the lead.
O’Banion quickly called timeout and inserted Lexi Therien back into the game for the final possession. Because of the timeout, the Greyhounds had a sideline inbounds pass on their own end of the floor and threw the ball directly to Therien in the post.
Samson put her hands straight up in the air to force the 6-1 Therien to shoot over her and the attempt came up short, hitting the underside of the rim.
“When [Therien] came in we knew they were going to try to throw it to the block. We told Kate to stay on the high side and wall up and she did what she was supposed to do,” Taylor said.
Navy-Loyola Men
Sophomore point guard Austin Benigni scored 27 points and Navy never trailed in beating Loyola Maryland, 69-62 Wednesday night at Reitz Arena in Baltimore.
Sophomore forward Donovan Draper posted his ninth double-double of the season with 14 points and 12 rebounds as the Midshipmen prevailed in a matchup of teams at the bottom of the Patriot League standings.
Sophomore center Aidan Kehoe provided production off the bench with 11 points for Navy (9-17, 5-10), which moved up to ninth place in the conference. Freshman guard Jordan Pennick (Spalding) got a rare start and performed well with nine points and five rebounds.
Junior forward Alonso Faure scored 15 points to lead Loyola (6-22, 4-11), which fell into last place. Sophomore guard Deon Perry, the leading scorer in the Patriot League, was limited to 11 points on 3-for-11 field goal shooting.
Navy at Holy Cross
Saturday, noon
Stream: ESPN+
Boston University at Loyola Maryland
Saturday, 5 p.m.
Stream: ESPN+