The Robert Morris Women’s Basketball team has experienced a rough last few months of the season. Following heartbreaking losses against Green Bay, Youngstown State, and Cleveland State, the Colonials finally returned with a win against Detroit Mercy.
Riding the momentum from the victory, the team hoped to turn things around and begin a post-season push when they took on Purdue Fort Wayne in Indiana on Wednesday night.
Unfortunately for Colonial fans, a weird night turned into a dark one as the team would fall 73-43 to the Mastodons.
Besides the abnormal results in the week leading up, another glaring anomaly was the absence of head coach Chandler McCabe on the sidelines Wednesday night. ESPN reported McCabe missed the game through illness.
Yet through being on the road and down their head coach, the Colonials hung with the Mastodons, and through a highly productive 2nd quarter, entered the break only down by four.
It was a team effort, with points coming from Aislin Malcom, Bailey Kuhns, Myriam Traore, Noa Gvion, and Eva Levingston. However that productivity would not be maintained through the latter stages of the game.
The Colonials shot 54% from the field in the second period, and 2-3 from the arc. Those numbers would drop significantly in the second half, with the team shooting 4-22 and 1-8 in the final two quarters.
Turnovers also continued to hurt the team, with Purdue Fort Wayne tallying 16 fast break points and 25 points off turnovers total.
The loss not only ends the Colonials season, but also begins an off-season of questions with unclear answers. Even though the team bettered their conference record from 10-10 to 11-9, they did finish lower in the conference, falling from fourth to sixth.
As is the state of collegiate athletics, the immediate thought becomes who will return for next season. The Colonials boast a young team, with five freshmen and notable sophomores like Jennica Suggs and Ava Leroux, both of whom have been injured throughout this season.
Other sophomores like Mallory Daly and Myriam Traore have also proven their skillsets hear in Moon Township, and could be players that Coach McCabe would want to keep around ahead of her third season in charge.
Top scorers like Aislin Malcom and Bailey Kuhns are seniors, meaning their next steps in eligibility are unclear, while returner from last season, Jada Lee, has finished her sixth and final season as a college player.
The future remains unclear for the Colonials, and the season’s dismal end comes off the back off a preseason where they were picked second in the poll. While the women’s team prepares for their work in an ever evolving off-season, the team will retain the respect and hope that it has earned over the last two seasons.
