Women’s Basketball Earns Number One Seed in Conference
Senior captain Emily Gibbons scored 14 points during her 17 minutes of play Saturday (Photo David Sinclair / Gettysburg College Athletics)
By Brody Tennant, Contributing Writer
The Gettysburg College women’s basketball clinched the number one seed in the Centennial Conference Saturday after their 78-31 win against Bryn Mawr College.
The victory brought the team’s conference record to 17-1 and their overall record to 21-2, and the team has been given the privilege to host both the semifinals and Centennial Conference Championships in its own Bream Gym.
Behind the Bullets in ranking is second-place Muhlenberg College, who has a conference record of 15-3.
Due to the Bullets defeating the Muhlenberg Mules in both of the matchups this season, the lady Bullets also scored the tiebreaker victories over the second-place team when applicable.
“We feel really good about where we are at this point in the season because we still have all of our goals in front of us and obtainable,” said Head Coach Nate Davis. The team feels very confident heading into their final games of the season, and soon the playoffs. “We are working hard to stay focused on one game at a time and not reflect on the season yet. We have some very important games coming up.”
The Bullets have put up some impressive statistics to earn this first place title. The Bullets made 50.7% of their attempted shots Saturday, and it is the fourth time the team has shot over 50% in a game this season. The team was also very successful from behind the arc, hitting 57.1% of their three pointers.
Eleven different players scored in the Bryn Mawr matchup, and 32 of the team’s points came from the bench.
The Bullets also matched their season high in steals, notching 14 and then converting them into 29 points.
The leading scorer for the Bullets was junior Emma Dorshimer, who scored a total of 15 points during her 19 minutes of play. She made 6 of her 7 shot attempts, while making all three attempts from three-point range.
Just behind her was senior captain Emily Gibbons, who scored 14 points off seven buckets. She also managed to grab eight rebounds while playing a total of 17 minutes.
Gibbons received her third Centennial Conference Player of the Week award this season for Saturday’s performance. It also marks the sixth time she has received this award in her career. She is only one of two players in the league averaging a double double this season.
“We are very happy for Emily receiving this honor,” said Coach Davis. “These individual awards are well deserved for Emily and a great accomplishment for our team. We feel like all individual awards are team awards.”
Sophomore Kiera Cesareo got her first start of the season Saturday, and she took full advantage by putting up 11 points and snagging seven boards.
After quickly making an 8-0 lead on the Bryn Mawr Owls, the Bullets grabbed a double-digit lead early in the game and never relented from there. In just under four minutes into the first quarter, Gettysburg had brought the score to 13-2. By halftime, the score was 37-17.
The Bullets lead never dropped below 20 points in the second half. At the end of the third quarter, first-year Meredith Brown was able to make a layup that took the team lead up to 30 points, the scores being 55-25.
Another contributing factor to Gettysburg’s 47-point victory was the team’s ability to out-rebound the Owls. The Bullets collected 44 rebounds to the Owls’ 28.
Bryn Mawr also had trouble shooting the ball, only being able to make 26.5% of its shots.
The Bullets will compete in final away game of their regular season today at 1:00 p.m. against sixth-ranked Ursinus College.
