GALESBURG, IL - It has been 2 years, 11 months, and 12 days since the Principia Women's Basketball team has celebrated a win. Happily, on Saturday at Knox College, that streak ended in dramatic fashion. The Panthers beat Knox College 65-62 in overtime for their first win of the season.
Junior Georgia Rather commented, "This is the first win since 2018 that the program has had, and no current players were a part of that. I think the win shows how much progress has been made as a whole, and the fact that we're a team of mostly underclassmen is super exciting for what the future of Principia Women's Basketball is going to look like."
Knox College was a formidable opponent for the Panthers as they had previously beaten powerful SLIAC conference opponents Eureka by 13 and Fontbonne by 14 in the last two weeks. Coach Dominguez knew that for his young team to be successful, that they had to come out and compete right from the start.
Knox took over the first quarter with their superior size and experience jumping out to a 18-7 advantage over the Panthers midway through the first quarter, before a 10-2 run by Principia cut the lead to 20-17 to end the first. Knox's experience showed in the second quarter as the young Panthers started to show their youth getting lured into quick threes and a rushed tempo and went down 33-22 at halftime.
The second quarter was the last quarter that the Panthers would lose. They battled in the third quarter to outscore Knox 14 to 6 and end the third quarter just down 3. The fourth quarter led to a second wind for the Panthers at the right time as they went on a 12 point run to take a 4 point lead. Knox battled back to tie the game at 54 with two chances to play spoiler at the foul line with 0.4 left on the game clock. Fortunately for the Panthers, Knox missed both free throws and the game went to overtime.
The Panthers showed tremendous maturity and grit in the overtime frame as they continued to play tough defense and outwork the much bigger Knox players on the boards. With a 3 point Panther advantage near the end of overtime, it came down to one last defensive stand to seal the win. After the heartbreak of Tuesday night, the women of Principia were not going to see another game slip through their fingers. They played tremendous team defense and allowed a highly contested a last second shot by Knox. As time expired on the game with Principia up 65-62, time also expired on the almost 3 winless years.
Freshman Paige Fowler led all scorers with a double double of 15 points and 11 rebounds. Sophomore Alana Hinson followed Fowler closely with 14 points and 7 rebounds, and freshman Lydia Klutho had 10 points and 9 rebounds. Aaliyah Scott, Georgia Rather and Tyliah Williams all gathered in 9 rebounds with 7 points, 6 points, and 6 points respectively. Coach Dominguez said afterwards, "We had two things that we learned as a team from the Franklin loss: we need to get better at the line and we need to rebound as a team. And today we did both of those things by just working as a team on both ends of the floor."
Freshman Paige Fowler commented, "It was amazing to be a part of this team coming together and playing as one strong unit. We've been working so hard for over a month, and I am just thrilled to be a part of such an amazing team. The team has matured a lot over the past few weeks, and I feel the sky's the limit for this group. We are so young and just starting to realize our own potential. This is our first win, but it most definitely will not be our last."
Up next: The women will play down in St. Louis in the Washington University McWilliams Classic next Friday and Saturday, December 3-4. Come out and support your Panthers!
