DETROIT (3/6/2017) -- The University of Detroit Mercy women's basketball team is heading to the 2017 Little Caesars Horizon League Women's Basketball Championship as the Titans dominated the second half in defeating second-seeded Wright State, 71-52, on Monday afternoon at Joe Louis Arena.
Third-seeded Detroit Mercy (18-13) will now take on top-seeded Green Bay (26-5) in the Horizon League Championship Tuesday, March 7, at Noon. The two teams split this year's regular season meetings with each winning on their home court.
It will be the seventh time in Horizon League history that the Titans will play for the conference title (1997, 1999, 2002-04, 2012) and all six previous meetings were also against Green Bay, with four of those games on the Phoenix home court (1997, 2003, 2004, 2012). Detroit Mercy won its lone championship in 1997 beating the Phoenix, 63-55, at Green Bay. The last trip to the title game came in 2012 as the Titans fell at Green Bay, 66-53.
The Titans shot a sizzling 65.5 percent (19-of-29) in the second half and were 8-of-11 (72.7 percent) from three, while the defense was stifling all game long holding Wright State to just 25.0 percent shooting (16-of-64) and 1-of-12 from the outside.
Senior
Rosanna Reynolds led the way with 19 points with six rebounds and five assists. Juniors
Brianne Cohen and
Nicole Urbanick along with freshman
Anja Marinkovic tallied 11 points apiece and senior
Haleigh Ristovski grabbed a team-high 14 rebounds. Urbanick also handed out a career-best five assists.
Detroit Mercy led by five after three, 47-42, and quickly moved it to double digits as Urbanick nailed a three and Reynolds hit a jumper for a 52-42 lead. The Titans extended it to 16, 59-43, with 6:04 left as sophomore
Brittney Jackson drained a 3-pointer, Cohen went inside for a layup and Jackson went inside for two more.
Detroit Mercy would not let up and Reynolds made it a 17-point lead, 63-46, with 4:09 left and the largest margin was the 19 points at the end of the game as
Lola Ristovski hit a 3-pointer from the corner -- Detroit Mercy's 11th of the game -- with just 1:10 left.
The Titans trailed by just one at the halftime break, 24-23. Like Sunday's quarterfinal,
Marinkovic hit two 3-pointers near the end of the second quarter to help pull the Titans to within one point. The first half was plagued by fouls with Wright State being whistled for just five, while Detroit Mercy was called for 16 fouls.
The Titans took the lead early in the third quarter with Cohen hitting back-to-back buckets to open the third. Reynolds followed with a triple to make it a 7-0 run and give Detroit Mercy a 30-24 lead coming out of the halftime break. Wright State would tie the game, 34-34, but Marinkovic hit her third triple of the game to give the Titans to lead back. Detroit Mercy would extend its advantage to eight points later in the frame with Urbanick hitting a triple, Marinkovic hitting two free throws and
Gracie Roberts nailing a 3-pointer from the wing.
Detroit Mercy was sharing the ball all day and finished with 19 assists, as opposed to just four for Wright State. Detroit Mercy was out-rebounded in the game, 47-39, but the Titans held a 19-15 edge in the second half.
The red, white and blue hit double-digit 3-pointers (11) for the 10th time this season and second-straight game. Detroit Mercy went 11-of-25 from downtown in the game and had seven different players fill it up from long range. Detroit was only 2-of-3 from the free throw line, while Wright State took 29 free throws.
Marinkovic and Urbanick each hit three 3-pointers in the game. Marinkovic tallied her third-straight double-figure scoring game and had multiple treys for the fourth-straight contest. She moved into third place (48) for 3-pointers by a freshmen.
Titan News & Notes
• Reynolds climbed into third place in field goals made (627) all-time, passing both Lisa Blackburn and Autumn Rademacher in the contest.
• Urbanick moved into fourth place in career 3-pointers with 193, after sinking three on Monday.
• Cohen continued her streak of double-digit scoring games with her 14th-straight double figure effort.
• The Titans improved to 15-5 when shooting better than 40 percent.
• Detroit Mercy extended its school-record for 3-pointers in a season to 252.
• The Titans reached 130 blocks on the season, which is the most since the 1996-97 season.
•
Haleigh Ristovski tallied her seventh double-digit rebound effort in the past 13 games, including five of 12 or more boards.
• Reynolds reached 550 career assists in the game.
• Detroit Mercy improved to 4-2 all-time in the Horizon League Championship against Wright State.
• The Titans also improved to 26-24 all-time in the conference tournament and 3-0 in games played at Joe Louis Arena.
