UNIVERSITY OF NORTH DAKOTA — Pre-game UND women’s basketball honored their seniors, Sammiyah Hoskin, Destinee Oberg, and Kacie Borowicz, however, the team did not do enough to honor them on the court.
“They pour their hearts into the program,” Head Coach Mallory Bernhard said. “They deserve better than tonight, so that’s on me.”
UND fell 102-57 to Oral Roberts in their final home game of the season at the Betty Engelstad Sioux Center.
“I’m not sure much went right for us today,” Bernhard said. “And it never really felt like we were playing our basketball.”
The first quarter started benignly. UND came back from a five-point deficit and even briefly took the lead. But then the cracks began to show, and as Bernhard said, it all “snowballed” from there. Even though they had prepared ahead, UND struggled with Oral Robert’s full-court press. Bernhard put the blame on herself.
“We knew exactly what was coming, but that’s where I really can’t point the finger in any direction but right here,” Bernhard said.” I just got to have our team better prepared for it.”
The Hawks quickly fell behind on offense, ending the first half of the game down 45-22.
“I don’t think we ever calmed down from the initial pressure,” Hoskin said. “We thought we were prepared, we weren’t.”
It did not help that Borowicz and Kiyah Hurst, UND’s top scorers, both got into foul trouble and, despite playing significant minutes, were carefully managed to avoid fouling out.
Borowicz fouled out midway through the fourth quarter, unable to finish out her senior game and ending her streak of double-digit point games. It was a tough last game at the Betty for a player who, as Bernhard said, has poured her heart into the program.
Despite some scoring, UND could not surmount the lead that Oral Roberts had built up.
“We just didn’t play our best basketball,” Hoskin said. “We beat ourselves up, and then we let them beat us up.”
UND finishes the season on the road after a week off, a week that Bernhard says will be devoted to fixing the weaknesses exposed in this game.
“We’ve seen presses quite a bit. We just unfortunately, have lost a little confidence in our press break,” Bernhard said. “And that’s something that when you have a full week of practice is something that we can maybe emphasize.”
After that week of work, UND will finish the season on the road, playing North Dakota State, South Dakota State, and the University of South Dakota, three top-five teams.
Hoskin says the team is motivated at the prospect of facing off against NDSU again.
“We should just come into every game like we’re playing NDSU,” Hoskin said. “Because the team that we were when we played them, the fire that we had, I think that should be us every game.”
With the Summit League standings shaping up, it is likely that UND will face this same Oral Roberts team in the first round of the Summit League Tournament.
Bernhard does not want to waste any time planning for their potential next meeting with the Golden Eagles.
“I honestly can’t wait to go upstairs and start looking at the standings,” Bernhard said. “I think there’s a good chance we have them again, so I’ll start drawing things up now.”
Maeve Hushman is a Dakota Student Sports Reporter. She can be reached at [email protected].
