River Falls, Wis. - The University of Wisconsin-La Crosse women's basketball team earned a 62-43 win at UW-River Falls Wednesday night in Don Page Arena in the regular-season finale for both teams. The Eagles improve to 19-6 overall and 8-6 in the Wisconsin Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (WIAC) while the Falcons drop to 14-11 overall and 4-10 in the conference.
UWL's 19 wins are the most since finishing 19-8 in 2019-20.
UWL will be the fifth-seed in the WIAC Tournament (presented by Culver's) and travel to fourth-seed UW-Oshkosh for a first round game on Tuesday, February 21 at 7 p.m. UW-River Falls ends its season with Wednesday's finale.
UW-River Falls scored the first five points of the game on Wednesday before UWL went on a 8-0 run to take a 8-5 lead.
Carly Coulthart got the Eagles on the scoreboard with a layup, followed by a
Kyah Steiner three-pointer and
Lauryn Milne hit three free throws. Kameri Meredith's layup for the Falcons with 1:25 left gave UW-River Falls a 10-8 lead. UWL's
Gabby Ritchie tied the game on a jumper and Steiner's layup with :31 left gave the Eagles a 12-10 lead. Olivia Miron tied the game for the Falcons on a layup with :21 remaining.
UWL scored the first seven points of the second quarter to take a 19-12 advantage. Steiner's layup with 6:06 left gave the Eagles their seven point lead. UW-River Falls used an 8-0 run of its own to take a 20-19 lead on Jocelyn Plonski's layup with 2:15 left. Steiner gave UWL a 23-22 halftime lead on a jumper with :04 remaining.
The Eagles opened the third quarter on a 9-2 run to take a 32-24 lead on
Casandra Warmsley's layup with 6:54 left. After UW-River Falls cut the lead to 32-27, UWL went on a 7-0 run to make it 39-27 on a pair of Warmsley free throws with 2:08 remaining. UWL led, 42-31, after three quarters.
Meredith hit a three-point field goal with 9:05 left in the fourth quarter for UW-River Falls to cut it to 43-34, but another 8-0 run by UWL gave the Eagles a 51-34 advantage with 5:57 remaining after a
Alana Gilles' layup. The Falcons could get no closer than 17 points the rest of the game.
UWL shot 40.0% from the field Wednesday, including 28.6% (six-of-21) from three-point range, and 75.0% (12-of-16) at the free throw line. Steiner led the Eagles with 19 points and 10 rebounds while Gilles totaled 16 points and six rebounds. Steiner had a team-high four assists while going seven-of-15 from the field, including two-of-four from three-point range. She was three-of-four at the line. Gilles finished six-of-ight from the field and four-of-six at the line.
UW-River Falls shot 29.3% from the field, including 23.3% (seven-of-30) from three-point range, and 50.0% (two-of-four) at the line.
Julia Seidel led the Falcons with 12 points.
