Women's basketball looks to clinch MAC West title in rematch against Rockets
Round two is here and it's potentially for the Mid-American Conference West Division title.
On Feb. 20, Toledo came to McGuirk Arena and squeezed out an 81-79 overtime victory over the Central Michigan women’s basketball team.
Now the two teams will play again, but at Toledo’s Savage Arena, where the Rockets are 7-4 this season. Even after the close loss on their home floor, the Chippewas aren’t going into Wednesday's game with doubt in their minds.
“I’m pretty confident about the game,” said senior point guard Da’Jourie Turner. “We had a couple of mental errors (in the first matchup) that I know we’ve fixed already. I know it won’t be the same mistakes from that game to the one tomorrow.”
Teams: Central Michigan (19-8, 13-3 MAC) vs. Toledo (16-11, 11-5 MAC)
Game time: 7:00 p.m.
Location: Savage Arena in Toledo, Ohio
Watch: ESPN3
Listen: http://www.cmuchippewas.com/collegesportslive/?media=516972
CMU is 13-3 in MAC play, but the loss to Toledo, who is 11-5 in the conference, gave the Rockets the tiebreaker.
If the Chippewas can avenge their earlier defeat, they will clinch the MAC West crown and at least the No. 2 seed in the conference tournament.
With so much riding on this game and the regular season finale on Saturday against Eastern Michigan, junior redshirt forward Jewel Cotton doesn’t want the team to underestimate the moment.
“We never want to look over a team,” Cotton said. “We’re literally going to take it one possession at a time and we’re going to get the win that way.”
A loss to the Rockets tomorrow would give Toledo the complete tiebreaker in the case the two teams are tied in the conference after Saturday, dropping CMU from the top spot in the West.
“We don’t want to look over (Toledo) and already be looking into the tournament because it can slip from under you really quickly,” Cotton said. “So that’s why we want to be focused and attack.”
In the first matchup, Toledo jumped out to a fast lead and led by as many as 11 points. The Chippewas stormed back and freshman point guard Presley Hudson made a layup with 4.2 second remaining to send the game into overtime.
The Rockets survived in the extra period after Turner’s last-second 3-pointer was astray, ending CMU’s eight-game winning streak.
“We know the most important game we’re going to play is the next game,” said senior forward Chelsea Lynn. “We had a few hiccups offensively and defensively (the first game). It’s about our performance, and if we perform well we should come out with a victory.”
Even though the stakes are high and the path to a top spot in the MAC tournament has been laid out for the Chippewas, Head Coach Sue Guevara said her team doesn’t use that as motivation.
“I am only concerned with how we play,” Guevara said. “All those other things are just byproducts of how we play.”
In order to get a victory in the rematch, Guevara said it will come down to one thing, ‘execution’.
“Toledo executed when they needed to and we did not,” Guevara said. “We gave them an early Easter present if you will, so for us it’s more about making sure that in (certain) situations we execute better than we did the last time.”
