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Ali Rohlfs

The Wittenberg women's basketball team continues to show its age. With most of their players in the rotation in the freshman and sophomore classes at Wittenberg, the Tigers have gone through their share of highs and lows this season as they build for the future and compete for a fourth straight North Coast Athletic Conference regular season title simultaneously.

While the latter goal is now somewhat unlikely, the Tigers still have a great deal to play for as they head into the home stretch of the season. Wittenberg is 12-8 overall and 8-3 in the NCAC, solid numbers for a young team that opened the season 1-4 while playing five teams with records currently at least six games over .500. The Tigers are tied for second in the NCAC, in the middle of a pack of teams that are all at least two games behind league-leader Kenyon.

On Jan. 22, Wittenberg jumped out to a 10-0 lead in the first three minutes against visiting Earlham and cruised to a 76-56 victory.

Rebounds played a key role in the match-up as the Tigers won that battle by 12. The Tigers also harrassed the Quakers into 28 turnovers, compared to 20 for Wittenberg. Senior guard Emilie Schmid (Canton, Ohio/Massillon Jackson) led the Tigers with 12 points on 5-of-6 shooting from the field. In addition, sophomore post Kathy Hittle (Noblesville, Ind./Noblesville) contributed 11 points and freshman post Katie Gregorevich (Northfield, Ohio/Walsh Jesuit) had 10 points. Also of note was the play of junior guard Brittany Landreth (Valparaiso, Ind./Valparaiso), who had seven steals, just two short of the school record.

In their next outing, the Tigers lost their shooting touch and even a stout defensive effort against NCAC-leading Kenyon couldn't make up for it in a 35-33 road loss on Jan. 26. It was the second time in two weeks that the Tigers held Kenyon to 35 points, but amazingly the two teams split the games.

A scoreless stretch of 9:16 to close the game squandered a seven-point lead as Kenyon chipped away until taking the lead on a jumper with five seconds left.

Only junior guard Carrie Jones (Greenville, Ohio/Greenville) offered any consistency offensively, finishing with 11 points on 4-of-7 shooting from the floor. Schmid added five points and Hittle added a team-high eight rebounds.

On Jan. 29, the Tigers rebounded from that tough loss with a 71-61 victory at Oberlin. The Tigers were led by freshman post Ali Rohlfs (Cincinnati, Ohio/Mount Notre Dame), who contributed 11 of her team-high 17 points in the first half. Senior guard Alison Nahrup (Loveland, Ohio/Mount Notre Dame) had a game- and career-high 10 rebounds, Schmid contributed 13 points and Hittle added 10.

Rounding things out, the Tigers captured a key 78-63 home victory over visiting Ohio Wesleyan on Feb. 1. It was the Tigers' seventh straight win over OWU.

For Wittenberg, the story was welcome offensive balance, keyed by a season-high 50 percent shooting performance from three-point range. With opponents focusing their defense on the Tigers' post players, guard play becomes even more crucial, and Wittenberg found some of it against the Bishops.

The Tigers picked up 16 points and eight rebounds from Gregorevich in her first career start, while Hittle enjoyed a record-setting night with seven points, eight rebounds and a school-record five blocked shots, one better than the mark previously shared by three players. As a team, Wittenberg finished with 11 blocks, tying a school record set in 1993 against Denison.

Rohlfs contributed 12 points and four rebounds, all offensive, in 16 productive minutes off the bench, Schmid was solid with seven points, seven rebounds and five steals and sophomore guard Megan Miller (Lancaster, Ohio/Lancaster) finished with 13 points in 14 minutes off the bench.

The Tigers are back at it again this weekend with a pair of key home games. On Friday, Allegheny, which is tied for fourth place and just one game back in the standings, visits the HPER Center. Hiram comes calling on Saturday. A pair of wins would all but lock up a home game in the quarterfinal round of the NCAC Tournament, which is scheduled for Feb. 22-25.