The women’s basketball team played its worst game of the season at an inopportune time, losing to St. John Fisher 60-44 in the ECAC semifinals on Saturday to close out its 2001-02 season.
“They did everything we expected them to do,” said Head Coach John Greene. “We just shot the ball horrendously.”
The Red Hawks got off to an abysmal start, shooting 3-for-28 in the first half and amassing only 11 points. The RPI defense performed well, holding the Cardinals to 25 percent from the floor, but Rensselaer still went to the locker room down by 13.
Kristin Kaczynski provided a bit of an offensive spark in the second half, hitting four of seven from downtown and scoring a game-high 21 points. The other four starters, however, shot 2-for-22 combined, and Rensselaer could never put together a run—they trailed by double digits for the rest of the game.
Greene praised his players for never giving up—they worked hard, he said, even when it was apparent they would not win.
Though the Red Hawks were the top seed in the tournament, they were forced to travel by the conference because the other three teams (Rochester, William Smith, and St. John Fisher) are all located in the western part of the state, and the league was seeking to cut travel costs. Rochester hosted the tournament instead, a decision that created some resentment from the Red Hawks.
“If this is the way the ECAC is going,” said Greene, then there’s no point to winning the top spot.
The disappointing finale left the team unsatisfied with the season as a whole.
“To say you’re not happy when you’re 18-8 is probably foolish,” Greene said, “but … we didn’t accomplish our goals.” Back in November, he named winning the conference as the team’s primary objective.
The Red Hawks should continue to be a strong team next season. They will lose Holly Neiweem, a 1000-point scorer and four-year starter at point guard, but everyone else on the team will be returning for the 2002-03 campaign. Sophomore Alyssa Comis, as Neiweem’s likely replacement, will be a key player for RPI, and the Red Hawks will rely heavily on Kristin Kaczynski and Kaitlyn Saunders for point production.
The team’s biggest advantage, according to Greene, is that “now everyone knows what it takes [to win the conference].” The Red Hawks are still a very young team—there will be only three seniors on the squad next season—and they should remain a force in the conference for several years to come.
