In a rematch of last weekend’s conference road games against Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) and University of Rochester, Washington University doubled up CMU, 80 to 40 Friday night, and avenged its heartbreaking loss at Rochester last weekend by beating them at home Sunday afternoon, 72 to 66, to sweep this weekend’s home games. The wins moved the University into a four way tie for first place with Rochester, Brandeis University, and New York University in the University Athletic Association (UAA) standings.

Doubt over whether the Bears would defeat CMU, who has netted an intimidating three wins over the entire season, lasted for only the first three minutes and 53 seconds of the game. With CMU leading eight to two, the Bears went on a 19 to nothing run during the next six minutes to all but crush any hope CMU had of pulling off the upset. CMU’s Melissa DeAngelo stopped the run with a three pointer, but couldn’t stop the bleeding as the Bears continued rolling by scoring 15 straight points, to lead 36 to 11. The lead never fell below 19 the rest of the game.

Four Bears players scored in double figures with sophomore guard Kelly Manning leading the way with 17 points in only 18 minutes of play. No one played more than 21 minutes. Senior guard Lesley Hawley scored 13 on five for ten shooting; freshman guard Sarah Schell scored 11; and junior center Hallie Hutchens netted a double-double with 10 points and 10 rebounds.

Perhaps the most disparaging stats of the game were the University’s dominance on the offensive glass and in the turnover margin. The Bears out rebounded the Tartans 22 to five, which led to 27 second-chance points. To go along with CMU’s bad rebounding, CMU turned the ball over a whopping 26 times, which the Bears turned into 40 easy points.

Lesley Hawley scored a career high 27 points and Hallie Hutchens dominated the paint with 20 as the University beat fourth ranked Rochester Sunday afternoon. Four Rochester players scored in double-digits in a game that was close in final score only. The Bears seemed well on their way to an easy win, leading 20 to 10 midway through the first half but sloppy play and tight defense allowed the Yellow Jackets to creep back into it. From 11:25 until :55 of the first half, the Bears scored only five points as Rochester took the lead. By halftime the University led by only two, 30 to 28.

Hutchens took control in the second half, where she scored 14 of her 20 points. At one point she scored 11 straight points for the Bears, mostly from inside the paint where Rochester was powerless to stop her. The University held onto the lead the remainder of the game and while the score might not reflect it they never seemed in danger of losing it. They had control the entire time. The play of the game came from Suzy Digby with just over nine minutes remaining in the game. A seemingly wide open Rochester player set up a three pointer on the wing. Digby, who must have been ten feet away when the player got the ball, rushed over, leapt up like a mini-Dikembe Mutumbo-or perhaps instead, Lisa Leslie-and swatted the ball as though serving a volleyball, right into Rochester’s bench which did not seem to know what to do with it. The sound was like a gunshot and the typical University size crowd of 400 were as loud as they’ve ever been. Digby thumped chests with her teammates, Rochester took a timeout, and the game, by all measures, was pretty much over.

Washington University vs. Carnegie Melon University
Friday, Feb. 6 at St. Louis
—————–at the half——final
Carnegie Mellon Univ.——22——40
Washington University—–45——80

Washington University vs. Rochester University
Sunday, Feb. 8 at St. Louis, MO
—————–at the half——final
Washington University——30——69
Rochester Univerisity——28——64

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