The return of Chloe Sterling wasn’t enough for the Hofstra University Women’s basketball team who took their fifth consecutive loss, a 69-46 defeat to Fordham University. With the win, the Rams improved to 7-4 while the Pride fell to 1-6.
Sterling played for 20 minutes in her first game back from knee surgery, scoring 11 points. Hofstra head coach Danielle Santos Atkinson was excited about Sterling’s performance.
“I thought she looked great, she came out and played with a lot of confidence,” Santos said. “She got to continue to get rhythm, continue building chemistry with the players around her, but I thought she did a great job.”
The Pride are dealing with some illness which limited some of their key players, “We are a little bit sick and under the weather for the most part,” Santos added. “… We told them a lot of them may only have 50%, a lot of them may have 60%, but whatever they do have, we want them to be able to give it.”
Hofstra’s defense hoped to force Fordham into taking a high volume of 3-pointers, due to the Rams struggles from deep this year – they are shooting just under 27% from beyond the arc. Despite Hofstra’s focus on paint defense, the Pride still allowed 30 points in the paint.
The Pride limited Alexis Black – Fordham’s leading scorer, to just 12 points on 3-7 shooting. On the other side, it was Sandra Magolico who topped the scoresheet for the Pride.
The Pride struggled heavily on offense, scoring just 10 points in the first half. Santos is hopeful for a more dynamic opening salvo in the future.
In response to the slow first-half, Santos said, “We gotta be able to throw that first punch.”
The Rams took advantage of Hofstra’s slow start, jumping out to a 32-10 halftime lead including six 3-pointers.
Hofstra came out of halftime firing, doubling their first half total in just three minutes and scoring the first 12 points of the third quarter to cut the Rams lead to 10 points. The Pride briefly cut their deficit to single digits after Sterling’s 3-pointer, but Fordham closed the third quarter on a 13-3 run, opening up a 19 point lead.
With about one minute left, sophomore starter Ema Karim left the game with an apparent leg injury; it is unclear whether she will miss any time in the future of the season.
Hofstra’s foul and turnover troubles continued, the Pride fouled 18 times and committed 27 turnovers, with 27 of Fordham’s points came off turnovers.
“The turnovers were just too much for this game. The amount of points they got off of turnovers and out of transition was just too much,” Santos said.
Much of Hofstra’s turnover trouble came in the first half, with 17 of the turnovers coming during the first two quarters.
The Pride’s next game was against Marywood University on Tuesday, Dec. 9 at 6 p.m. at the David S. Mack Sports and Exhibition Complex.
