SPRINGFIELD, Ohio — The Wittenberg Tigers put together their biggest scoring output since the opening game of the 2006-07 season to cruise past visiting Earlham, 83-52, in the North Coast Athletic Conference Tournament quarterfinals.
The win was Wittenberg's sixth in the last seven games, and it earned the Tigers a berth in the NCAC Tournament semifinals against Allegheny. Wittenberg, the tourney's No. 2 seed, and Allegheny, the No. 3 seed after tying the Tigers for second place in the regular season but losing both head-to-head match-ups, will square off at 5:30 p.m. Friday at Denison.
In this one, the Tigers made an early lead stand up. After slowly expanding their advantage to 36-28 by halftime, Wittenberg then turned on the afterburners while emptying the bench over the course of the final 20 minutes to defeat the Quakers for the third time this season.
Wittenberg, which never trailed in the game, improved to 15-10 overall, while Earlham's season comes to a conclusion with a 4-22 mark.
Wittenberg held a four-turnover advantage in a game that was relatively clean from that standpoint, but perhaps the most important statistic was rebounding. The Tigers held a whopping 53-30 edge in that department, including 20 offensive rebounds. In addition, Wittenberg had its second-best shooting game of the season at 50 percent, compared to Earlham's 30 percent.
Individually, the Tigers put four players in double figures offensively, led by senior wing Rachel Clark-Haggy (South Charleston, Ohio/Southeastern) with 18 points. Senior post Kathy Hittle (Noblesville, Ind./Noblesville) added 14 points, junior post Ali Rohlfs (Cincinnati, Ohio/Mount Notre Dame) contribued 12 points off the bench and senior guard Andrea Hackett (Springfield, Ohio/Catholic Central) finished with 10 points. Not to be overlooked, junior post Katie Gregorevich (Northfield, Ohio/Walsh Jesuit) added nine points and a career-high 14 rebounds.
Earlham was paced by Shontavia Davis with 18 points and Starr Gary with 11.