UNCW men win, women drop weekend contests at home
WILMINGTON, N.C. (WWAY) — It was a busy weekend for UNCW basketball with three games being played over three days at Trask Coliseum, but it came with some mixed results.
The Seahawk men defeated rival Campbell 78-75 on Saturday while the adjacent days saw the women lose to Elon 72-62 on Friday followed by falling to Drexel 76-67 on Sunday.
The latter contest is the 27th straight loss the ladies have had to the Dragons as well as their fifth overall. Not only are Tia Dobson and Kate Hollifield out for the season, Torin Rogers also sat out Sunday’s contest.
Head Coach Nicole Woods expects Rogers back soon, but is still navigating a roster down most of its starters from early on in the season.
“Any time you’ve got players that have played 30 minutes a game, it’s always difficult,” Woods said. “But I thought our other players stepped up. Angelina Pelayo had her first start today. I remember my first start and being like, ‘oh man, this is different.’ Then I thought she came in the second half and settled down a little bit. We’re going to need her. She anchors that paint for us defensively as well as on the rebound side of things. We just need those players in whatever position whenever their time is called to be able to step up and be ready and I thought they all were today.”
(Photo: Colton Emswiler/WWAY)
As for the men, their win marked their seventh in a row. It came while overcoming a 13-point deficit exactly one game after coming back to defeat Stony Brook after trailing by 24.
Head Coach Takayo Siddle says they need to win games like this in order to get where they want to be.
“If you want to be a champion, you have to be able to respond to adversity the right way,” Siddle said. “Adversity comes in the games a lot and we have to have the right response. We always talk about E+R=O. Event, plus the response, equals our outcome. I thought we did a great job responding and the outcome ended up being great for us.”
(Photo: Colton Emswiler/WWAY)
UNCW is the last unbeaten team in the CAA while every other school has at least two losses in conference play. The players say they aren’t going to let up despite the cushion in the standings.
“A win’s a win,” senior Madison Durr said. “This conference is a good conference. There’s going to be days we don’t shoot the ball well, days that we shoot the ball well. At the end of the day, it’s a heavyweight matchup. That’s what we’ve been preaching. We hear the noise. We’re trying to keep chipping away and we keep getting wins day by day.”
