UNIVERSITY CENTER, Mich. – The Saginaw Valley State University women's basketball program lost a hard-fought battle 59-57 to Ferris State University. SVSU (6-13, 3-6 GLIAC) held a three-point lead at the half and had the largest lead of the game when the Cardinals were up by 12 points in the first quarter. FSU (14-2, 8-1 GLIAC) made their final shot of the game for their two-point win.
Saginaw Valley was led by the Meijer Player of the Game, Aleshia Jones, with 23 points shooting 9-for-17. Tyler Scheid and Victoria Stafford both scored 10. Lydia Meredith brought down seven rebounds for the team lead. The team shot 46.2% from the floor and nailed eight of their 10 free throws.
It was an explosive start for SVSU jumping out to an 12-point lead with a 15-3 run. Jones, Meredith, Scheid, Stafford, Jessica Massey, and Saniaa Walker all drained a bucket with Jones knocking down a three as well. The Bulldogs responded with a 10-0 run to end the quarter with their final six points all coming from the charity stripe.
To start the second, both teams traded buckets as Ferris tied the game twice and Saginaw Valley took the small advantage back. A 5-2 run for the Bulldogs put them ahead for the first time more than halfway through the second quarter. Jones and Scheid made two free throws each to put the Cardinals up 25-22. The teams both scored four points to finish the first half with SVSU up 29-26.
After two free throws for Jones, a 5-0 run for Ferris tied the game at 31-31. Another 5-0 run gave Ferris the lead before the Cardinals closed the distance with a 6-2 run of their own coming from two Stafford layups and a Scheid jumper. Jones followed up the run with two shots of her own to go up 43-40 before a free throw for Ferris ended the third with the Cardinals holding a two-point lead.
The Bulldogs scored 18 in the fourth for the most by either team in a quarter. An 8-2 run to start put Ferris ahead 49-45. Both teams put down two shots before Meredith and Jones made back-to-back layups tied the game at 53-53. Ferris took the two-point lead two more times, but Jones drained two clutch shots tying the game up again before the Bulldogs final shot with 22 seconds left gave them the 59-57 lead and the win.
When asked about the message to the team after a close loss, head coach Jenny Pruett said,
"We're going to celebrate the fact that we played really hard and we fought for 40 minutes. We just came up short."
SVSU women's basketball hits the road next week heading to Purdue Northwest (8-11, 3-6 GLIAC) on Thursday and Parkside (11-6, 6-3 GLIAC) on Saturday. Tip-off against the Pride is scheduled for 5:30 PM EST from John Friend Court in Hammond, Indiana.
