The Carleton Ravens women’s basketball team continued their run-up to the regular season with a 61-48 victory over the Concordia Stingers at the Ravens Nest Oct. 6.
Coming off a convincing 80-50 win against Montmorency College Nomades in their first exhibition game Oct. 2, the Ravens never trailed against a sloppy Concordia outfit to improve their pre-season record to 2-0.
A slew of turnovers prevented the game from developing any kind of flow in the first quarter. But some strong play from fourth-year Ravens guards Kendall MacLeod and Alyson Bush helped the home team secure a 14-11 lead at the end of the opening frame.
The Stingers mounted a comeback of sorts in the second, with Kaylah Barrett sinking a couple of three-pointers to get her team to within one point of the Ravens. But despite moving the ball around well and being strong on the boards, Concordia still went into the locker room down 25-21 at halftime.
That was the closest the Stingers would get to Ravens for the rest of the game. A three-pointer from Bush early on in the third set the tone for the quarter. Bush led from the front, asserting her dominance in the paint and nailing her shots with ease. The Ravens entered the final quarter up 40-33.
A series of late three-pointers from the Stingers’ Natasha Raposo wasn’t enough, as the Ravens ended up with a comfortable 13-point win. But it was an unsatisfying one, according to head coach Taffe Charles.
“We got a lot of youth in the squad so we’ve got to try and integrate them with the veterans which is especially difficult in the beginning of the year,” Charles said. “We’re just not a very good basketball ‘team’ right now but it’s a process. We’ve got to become a better team, read the game better, rebound better.”
Looking former, Charles said more practice will be key for the Ravens, who begin the regular season at McMaster University Nov. 11.
“There’s a lot of things we can do better,” he said. “[We’ve] just got to get together, get more practice under our belts and hopefully we can be a better team when the regular season starts.”
The Ravens’ exhibition season will continue during the Metro Glebe women’s basketball tournament Oct. 14-16 at Carleton.
