Miami, Fla. – The Robert Morris University women's basketball team put forth a valiant fourth quarter effort this afternoon on the opening day of the FIU Thanksgiving Tournament, but it wasn't enough as the Colonials fell to Stetson University, 68-60.
Trailing by 13 at the beginning of the final frame, Robert Morris (3-3, 0-0 NEC) trimmed the deficit to as little as six but could not push past that barrier. Junior forward Megan Smith scored a season-high 21 points – two shy of tying her career best – on 8-of-10 shooting to lead the Colonials, adding team honors in rebounds (7) and blocks (3).
"[Megan] definitely had a good game," said first-year head coach Charlie Buscaglia. "She was very focused and when she had her opportunities, she took it to them. I saw a lot of positive energy and leadership on the floor, and I thought she was one of the bright spots."
A Smith trifecta off a steal cut the difference to single-digits with 7:28 left, but Stetson (5-1, 0-0 A-Sun) responded with a pair of free throws to make it 51-40. The junior forward then got three the old fashioned way three minutes later to chip away at the Hatters' lead, and although Britani Saunders answered that with a three-pointer, freshman forward Nadège Pluviose converted an and-one to set the score at 54-46.
Smith followed that with a layup on the next possession, which was followed up with two foul shots from Sarah Sagerer. Senior guard Anna Niki Stamolamprou then sank a shot in the lane with 2:28 remaining to make it 56-50, but Stetson then scored the next six points to essentially seal the contest.
"We have to be ready to play for 40 minutes," said Buscaglia. "Stetson has done well – they only had one loss to Arkansas on their floor – so they're a team that is probably one of the country's top mid-majors. In the fourth quarter, we finally started to pick our heads up and outworked them. Good things happen when you outwork people and I think the fourth quarter was attributed to us outworking them and pushing to the end."
Neither team could gain much of an edge in the first quarter as the lead was traded five times. After junior center Mikalah Mulrain and the Hatters' Myka Johnson-Matthews traded buckets to begin the second frame, RMU used a layup from Stamolamprou and a three-point play from Mulrain to go up 20-16. However, Stetson outscored the Colonials, 13-3, over the final 7:19 of the half to carry a 29-23 lead into the break.
The Hatters, who have made six consecutive postseason tournaments (3 WNIT, 2 NCAA, 1 WBI) and returned all five starters and eight letterwinners from a season ago, turned that six-point edge into a 15-point one over the course of 6:14 with a 14-5 run to open the third quarter. Smith and freshman center Nneka Ezeigbo briefly halted runs with points in the paint, but Stetson would hold an 18-11 difference in the frame to carry its double-digit advantage into the fourth.
"As we got into our situations of a bad moment – if a shot didn't go in or a bad turnover – we would put our heads down way too much," continued Buscaglia. "That's something we work on in practice and we're not that team. We should have been more ready for that moment and through the grind of the game."
Brown added 10 points for the Colonials, followed by Stamolamprou's nine and Mulrain's eight. RMU shot 43.4 percent (23-of-53) from the field, thanks in part to a 9-of-14 performance in the fourth quarter.
Saunders tied Smith for high-scoring honors with 21 points. The Hatters converted on 47.7 percent (21-of-44) of their field goals and made 22-of-26 free throws.
Robert Morris will play tournament host Florida International, who fell in overtime to Weber State in the invitational's opening game, at 2:00 p.m. on Sunday, Nov. 27.
