Box Score ALBANY, N.Y. – Helena Kurt (Spanga, Sweden/Igelstavikens Gymnasium) and Jasmine Walker (North Brunswick, N.J./North Brunswick) scored 11 points apiece, but the ninth-seeded Monmouth University women's basketball team fell to top-seeded Quinnipiac, 82-61, Friday afternoon at the Times Union Center. With the loss, the Hawks conclude their season at 13-18, while the Bobcats won their 19th-straight game to improve to 29-3. The Hawks played the Bobcats evenly (35-35) in the second half, but couldn't dig their way out of an early deficit.

Senior Sara English (Smithtown, N.Y./Smithtown West [UMass]) narrowly missed a double-double with nine points and 10 rebounds in her final collegiate game. Walker also added seven rebounds and two steals, while Kurt had five rebounds, three assists and three steals. Christina Mitchell (Baltimore, Md./MATHS) chipped in with nine points and six rebounds.

Val Driscoll led Quinnipiac with 17 points and nine rebounds. Jasmine Martin and Gillian Abshire had 16 points apiece, with Abshire also adding eight assists. Maria Napolitano also finished in double figures with 12 points. Nikoline Ostergaard also dished out six assists.

“I'm really proud of my team and the fight that we showed,” said Monmouth Head Coach Jenny Palmateer. “Quinnipiac jumped out on us in the first eight minutes of that game. We were really struggling to score and I felt like they were hitting everything. We got down really early and other than that, we had chances where we could've rolled over and died, but we didn't. The last 32 minutes of that game, we played them to a 55-52 ballgame. That's not the kind of start you can afford to get off to against a team like Quinnipiac. I thought we had some good looks, but they were rimming in and out and we couldn't get anything going offensively. But I'm really proud of the way that my team really battled back, hung tough and scrapped to try to make a comeback.”

Quinnipiac scored the game's first 10 points to take an early lead. The Hawks scored five-straight points on a Mitchell three and a Walker jumper at the 14:47 mark to cut the deficit to 15-9. But the Bobcats responded with a 12-0 run to push their lead to 18. Quinnipiac further extended its lead to 23 on five occasions in the initial stanza and settled for a 47-26 advantage at the break.

Walker led Monmouth with six points and four rebounds in the first half. Martin and Driscoll had 12 points apiece for Quinnipiac, with Driscoll adding five rebounds. Abshire had eight points and five assists at the half.

Monmouth came out swinging in the second half, outscoring Quinnipiac, 15-5, to begin the period. The run was highlighted by a 4-0 spurt to begin the half and seven-straight points to cut the deficit to 52-41. The Hawks' momentum looked to be continuing when they forced another defensive stop and a long rebound sent Monmouth running. But a turnover sprung the Bobcats the other way for a fast-break lay-up, putting an end to the run.

“If we converted a transition opportunity there, we could've cut the lead to single digits – eight or nine points with 13 minutes to go and that's a totally different ballgame now,” said Palmateer. “It gets to single digits, maybe they get a little tight and we could make a little bit of a run right there. But Quinnipiac is such a strong team and all the credit goes to them. They're a deep team. They have a bunch of shooters and they played really well today.”

Quinnipiac would methodically add onto its lead until it reached 29 points on a Napolitano free throw with 3:39 left. The Hawks scored the final eight points of the game to account for the final margin.
 
For the game, Quinnipiac outshot the Hawks, 36.1 percent (26-72) to 31.6 percent (25-79) from the floor, 37.1 percent (13-35) to 19.2 percent (5-26)  from long range and 77.3 percent (17-22) to 46.2 percent (6-13) from the free-throw line. Monmouth outrebounded the Bobcats, 53-51, including a 20-15 edge on the offensive boards.