Ashland rolls over Harding
ASHLAND 90, HARDING 77
The Harding University women’s basketball team’s season came to an end Wednesday night at the hands of the undefeated Ashland Eagles.
Harding lost 90-77 to Ashland in the NCAA Division II semifinals on the campus of Ohio Dominican University in Columbus.
Harding finished 31-4 in a season where it won the Great American Conference regular-season and tournament championships, and the NCAA Central Region title.
Ashland (35-0) will play Virginia Union in Friday’s championship game at 6 p.m. Central. Virginia Union defeated California Baptist 8681 in an earlier semifinal game Wednesday.
Harding’s 17-game winning streak was snapped. The Lady Bisons’ last loss before Wednesday was Jan. 26 at Southwestern Oklahoma State.
“We played a really good team tonight,” Harding women’s Coach Tim Kirby said. “Every time they got an open three, they knocked it down. They’re really well-coached. They had some good players on the floor.
“We turned it over too many times.”
Caroline Hogue led Harding with 24 points and 12 rebounds. She also had three assists and three blocked shots. A’ndrea Haney finished with 13 points, 8 assists, 5 rebounds and 3 steals. Sydnie Jones and Riley Rose each added 10 points for the Lady Bisons, who shot 47 percent (31 of 66) but committed 21 turnovers.
Laina Snyder scored 25 points to lead Ashland, which shot 50 percent (31 of 62) and made 10 three-pointers. Andi Daugherty had 23 points while Maddie Dackin had 14. Jodi Johnson poured in 13 points and Kelsey Peare added 11.
Ashland used a 17-1 run in the second quarter to stretch its lead to 53-33 with 1:16 left in the first half thanks to four three-pointers. Rose ended the run with a jumper for Harding to pull the Lady Bisons within 53-35.
The Lady Bisons trailed 55-37 at halftime, allowing Ashland to shoot 55.3 percent (21 of 38) from the floor and 7 of 15 from three-point range. Harding shot 53.3 percent (16 of 30) in the first half, but it was 1 of 8 from beyond the arc and had 12 turnovers.
Ashland went on a 9-0 run early in the third quarter to extend its lead to 64-39 with 8:03 to play. Johnson’s three-pointer increased the Eagles’ lead to 73-45 with 4:22 left in the third quarter. Ashland led 83-61 entering the fourth quarter.
Haney’s three-point play trimmed Ashland’s lead to 85-72 with 4:44 to play, but Daugherty hit a three-pointer with 4:18 remaining and extended Ashland’s advantage to 88-72.
“Ashland is a good team,” Haney said. “Even though we didn’t want to go out like this, kudos to them. They did a great job tonight.”
The Eagles led 27-23 at the end of a first quarter in which there were six ties and seven lead changes. Peyton Padgett’s layup tied the game at 19-19 with 2:30 left in the quarter, but Johnson hit a three-pointer to give Ashland a 22-19 lead with 2:18 to play.
Kirby was proud of how far Harding got this season. A season ago, the Lady Bisons lost in the first round of the GAC Tournament as a No. 2 seed. But in 2016-2017, the Lady Bisons enjoyed their best season in program history.
“You hope that the things you do as a program carry over day to day, week to week, year to year,” Kirby said. “It didn’t just happen. It comes
with a lot of work and a lot of time out there working on your game.
“The biggest thing about this team was it was a team. They always got along. You could tell they liked each other. They enjoyed their time together. I can be positive about what’s going to happen in the future because we’ve got a deep group coming back.”