Box Score




NAMPA, Idaho — The Crusaders are playoff bound!

The Northwest Nazarene women's basketball team continued its late-season surge by pulling away in the second half and topping visiting Concordia, 91-69, on Saturday night at the Johnson Sports Center to punch its ticket to the Great Northwest Athletic Conference tournament.

The win, combined with a 70-47 victory by No. 1 Alaska Anchorage over Seattle Pacific sends NNU to the postseason.

"That's pretty nice, the girls were pretty excited in the locker room," said NNU interim head coach John Hartman.

"They deserve it, they've worked hard this year," Hartman added. "They've just had to overcome a ton of adversity, and to be able to acknowledge their season like they have — it's just incredible to see their resiliency in what they've done this year."
 

NNU (11-13 overall, 9-9 GNAC) has won 6 of its last 9 games after a rocky start on the road and a mid-season coaching change.

Shrugging off those distractions, and a late first-half charge by the visiting Cavaliers (6-20, 4-14), the Crusaders played determined basketball in the final 20 minutes to pull away and secure their first postseason berth since 2013.

Coming out of the break leading just 44-40, a Taylor Simmons layup ignited a 17-5 charge by NNU.

Simmons had six points in the run, which Kate Cryderman capped with a bucket that put the Crusaders comfortably in control up 61-45 with about 7 minutes gone in the third quarter.

"We had a little talk at halftime," Hartman said, adding, "actually a lot of listening and me talking about some things we've been talking about for three weeks and we were finally able to execute tonight."

On top, NNU didn't let up as an Ellie Logan bucket made it 68-49 a minute into the fourth quarter, and a Carly Parker basket late stretch the lead to as much as 87-64.

Simmons led the way for NNU with 21 points in the win, while Logan added 18 points and Cryderman scored 13.

Elayna Rice added two points and eight rebounds for the Crusaders, who now finish the regular season hosting Central Washington on Tuesday and Montana State Billings on Thursday in what will be a tune-up for the GNAC Tournament hosted by St. Martin's, March 3-5.