The Red Raiders women’s basketball team has scored another victory at home, winning their sixth game in a row. On Saturday, Jan. 13, Northwestern hosted the Hastings College Broncos, which ended in a victory for the women’s basketball team 68-53.
The game started with Hastings winning the tip-off, but NW was the first team to score. NW kept the lead throughout most of the first quarter, only changing leads with Hastings once. Fast ball movement gave the Raiders a lot of opportunities at scoring and kept the Hastings defense continually on the move. The first quarter ended with the Raiders leading Hastings 25-22.
The second quarter of play was a close-scoring game between both teams. The lead changed hands three times throughout the 10 minutes of play. The Hastings offense was a dominant presence during the second quarter, scoring several points off jumpers from inside the paint. NW had a lot of scoring opportunities but was unable to capitalize on them as the ball just didn’t seem to want to fall for the Raiders. Despite this, however, the first half of play would end with NW holding a one-point lead over Hastings, 34-33.
After halftime, the Raiders came out ready to play. The third quarter started off with a short-lived Hastings lead. By three minutes of play, NW was back on top and it would stay that way for the rest of the third quarter and into the fourth. Strong scoring for the Raiders by everyone on the court resulted in a third-quarter finish with a 14-point lead over the Broncos (53-39).
NW control of the game continued into the fourth quarter as the lead continued to hold, resulting in a Red Raider victory 68-53. Freshman Anna Kiel, junior Haley Birks and junior Kassidy De Jong scored in the double-digits. De Jong also managed her first double-double of the season with 11 rebounds. NW is currently 14-5 overall on the season (9-2 in GPAC play).
The Saturday matchup against Hastings was the second time this season that the two teams have played each other. In their last match up in November, NW came out on top 70-63.
This coming week NW women’s basketball will play away against Briar Cliff, at 2 p.m. on Saturday, Jan. 20., and will host Morningside at 6 p.m. on Wednesday, Jan. 24.
