Decorah, IA -- Tonight, the women's basketball team from North Central University (NCU) traveled across Minnesota's border to Iowa for a matchup with the Luther College (LC) Norse. As a participant in the Iowa Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (IIAC), the Knights got the best of the Rams in their previous contest, with 88-80 as the final score. This evening, the Norse proved to be the better team as they handed NCU an 84-54 loss.
A cold start for the visiting Rams led to a 9-0 lead for the Norse. Finally, after 3:30 gone in the first,
McKenzie Latzke scored the first bucket for NCU. North Central struggled to stop the Norse in the first quarter as the home team put up 22 points. A three-pointer from
Savi Rael and free throw makes by
Brycelyn Brewster and Latzke was the only offensive output in the first quarter as the Rams trailed 22-8.
Moriah Landry scored NCU's first points of the second quarter to spark the team offensively. Then
Kaitlyn VanderPloeg got going with back-to-back scores in the paint.
Piper Flemming fed into the momentum with a three-point make as North Central went on a 9-0 run to cut Luther's lead to just six at 25-19. VanderPloeg closed out the first half on a 7-point tear as the Rams hung in there with the Norse, trailing 35-26 at the break.
Following halftime, Luther College opened the second half with back-to-back threes and an 8-0 run to extend their lead to 17. A
Brycelyn Brewster layup would stop the bleeding momentarily, but not before the Norse ripped off another 8-0 run. Brewster had some good sequences late in the quarter, turning steals into fast break buckets. However, Luther shot the ball well in the quarter at 57% as they scored 28 points to pull away. In the fourth,
Alaysia Rusch knocked in her second three-pointer of the game with just under six minutes to go. In the waning minutes of the game, junior
Lydia Schroeder got her first bucket of the game as she saw her first action back from injury. Turnovers proved to be costly as NCU turned the ball over 21 times in the game. Luther cruised to an 84-54 win late in the fourth.
Top Performers:
Looking Ahead:
The Rams will return to Minnesota to visit the Macalester College Scots for the Twin Cities Invitational in St. Paul. The first game is set to begin on Friday, November 22nd at 8:00 PM.
All fans are encouraged to tune into the official Rams
Instagram,
Facebook, and
Twitter (X) pages for updates on women's basketball and all things NCU Athletics.
