Women's Basketball Ends Losing Skid Against Winless Medgar Evers

 BY Curtis AshleySports WriterThe City College of New York Women's basketball team went in to Friday evening's game against Medgar Evers College carrying a three-game losing streak on their back. Medgar arrived at Nat Holman Gymnasium sporting a 0-12 overall record. The match was a pivotal moment for both teams. City looked to get back to their winning ways, adding to what has been one of their best seasons in recent history, while Medgar aimed to turn their embarrassment of a season around, trying to salvage as much of it as possible. Only one could achieve their goal that night, and, as fate would have it, CCNY was the winner of the game, defeating the Cougars of Medgar Evers 62-52.The win doesn't really come as a shocker. As mentioned before, Medgar came in to the game with a 0-12 record. They now find themselves 0-13, 0-6 in conference play, and last in the conference. City College is now 7-6 overall. The win also brings their CUNYAC record back to 3-3, placing them at fifth in the conference.Liz Durchhalter finished the game with a team high 15 points, making 4-of-6 from beyond the arch. Tiara Brown was as productive as she has been all season, with 14 points, nine rebounds, and four steals."We were being really unselfish with the ball, that's how I got those points that I got," Durchhalter said after the win.A typical win for the girls, which might be the only issue with the game. Medgar Evers, has been blown out by most of their opponents this season, including conference games against Brooklyn and Baruch, where they lost by 40 or more points. While those two schools in particular are in the top half of the conference, making that kind of dominant performance more than expected, City was in position to pull off such a feat as well in this game.With just under a minute remaining in the third period, the Lady Beavers led the Cougars 57-26, making it a 31 point game. This score was indicative of the last time City played Medgar, in the last game of the 2014-2015 regular season, when they defeated them 60-31. At the start of the fourth period, Head Coach Jaime Angeli brought in his bench players to put away the game, but things did not go as planned for City. The Cougars would outscore City 24-5 in the final period, bringing the deficit down to only 10 points before the final buzzer sounded."It's just disappointing the way we finished the game, it's really embarrassing," Angeli mentioned in a post-game interview. "We haven't had a lot of people on our team in the last several years, and now we have a deep bench and I can't play them all. And when they get an opportunity to play like they did tonight, you want them to step up and enjoy their experience, but that was a nightmare.""I don't know what happened with the girls coming off the bench, even though I was happy that they got in. We just need to put more pressure on the ball, we just need to work on it," Durchhalter said. "They need to show that they're worth getting more playing time."Though City didn't give up the win to Medgar, this was the closest game between the two since the last time Medgar Evers defeated City, which was in the 2010-2011 season when City lost 43-44.There's no time to sit and pick at what went wrong, with the girls' next game being on Sunday against non-conference opponent Misericordia University. They're a 3-9 team from the Mac Freedom Conference, currently on a seven game losing stretch. The game will be played at CCNY, in the Nat Holman Gym. This favors City, not only because of how they've performed at home, but how Misericordia has played on the road. The Lady Beavers are 5-2 when playing on their own hardwood, while Misericordia has yet to win an away game this season. City hopes to keep the momentum going, and find their way to another win.