ITHACA, N.Y. – The Columbia women's basketball team locked up its second straight Ivy League regular-season Championship with an 82-46 victory over Cornell on Saturday at Newman Arena. The Lions end the regular season 22-5 overall with a 13-1 mark in Ivy League competition, its best league record in program history.
The title is Columbia's second in program history after winning their first last season – the Lions officially joined the league in 1986-87. Saturday's victory was also Columbia's 10th in a row, its second such winning streak of the season. The 10 consecutive wins also match a program record.
"This was a really important moment for us, not just to win this game, but to put an exclamation point on our regular conference season," head coach Megan Griffith '07CC said. "We want to head into the Ivy League Tournament with some confidence and knowing that we can execute a game plan over 40 minutes. Today, … when we challenged them, they answered the call."
Four Lions reached double figures scoring, led by a game-high 19 points and 11 rebounds from junior co-captain Kitty Henderson. She notched her fifth career double-double, knocking down 7-of-12 from the field and helping the Lions to a staggering, 54-20, advantage on the glass.
"It just shows the culture that we've built here and that Coach G has built here is sustaining," Henderson said afterward. "I'm really proud of us for keeping that going. [As for today], in the first half we went away from each other a little bit. We went back to basics and what we've been doing all week, which was good to see."
Columbia held just a nine-point lead at halftime, 37-28. With shots not falling from the outside, the Lions found ways to score inside and dominated the paint in the first half, 24-12. Their rebounding margin was already 26-12 at the midway point.
First-year
Riley Weiss went on to finish with 17 points off the bench. She scored 10 in the fourth quarter alone to help the Lions pull away.
Cecelia Collins (14) and
Abbey Hsu (13) rounded out the Lions in double figures.
"I thought we adjusted at halftime. We needed to clean some things up on the defensive end as far as fouls go," Collins said.
Collins scored Columbia's first six points of the afternoon to help the Lions build a 9-6 lead at the media timeout. The Lions showed dominance on the glass from the beginning but were plagued by six first-quarter turnovers.
Columbia used a 6-0 run midway through the second quarter to force the Big Red to call for time trailing by eight, 26-18, at the 5:33 mark. Weiss was the catalyst, connecting on consecutive drives. The Lions went ahead by double figures for the first time on a Henderson layup, 33-22. The Australian then sent the Lions into the locker room with some momentum, hitting 1-of-2 at the foul line with 5.3 seconds left, collecting her own miss and scoring before the horn.
Coach Griffith's halftime speech rallied the Lions to a dominant third quarter. They outscored Cornell, 21-8, and ended the period on a 9-0 run to take a 58-36 lead into the fourth.
The final period was simply a celebration.
Columbia will host the 2024 Ivy League Basketball Tournaments next weekend at Levien Gymnasium. The women's tournament runs Friday-Saturday, March 15-16. Friday's first semifinal between the No. 1 seed and No. 4 seed is scheduled for 4:30 p.m., followed by the second semifinal between the No. 2 and No. 3 seeds at 7:30 p.m.
"Ivy Madness only comes to New York City once while we're here," Collins went on to say. "We've been preparing all year for this so now it's just about seizing the opportunity in front of us.
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