By Don Owen
NKyTribune reporter
Defending national champion Amherst (Mass.) College started off slowly Friday night but finished impressively during a 66-48 win against Thomas More College in the NCAA Division III Final Four at Rochester, Minn.
After falling behind 5-0 in the opening two minutes, Amherst countered with 13 consecutive points as part of a 21-6 run that built a 21-11 lead at the end of the first quarter. Amherst later held off a pair of Thomas More rallies to remain unbeaten (32-0) and advanced to Saturday’s national championship game.
Thomas More’s Madison Temple attempts a shot against the defense of Amherst’s Emma McCarthy on Friday night. (Photo by Allen Ramsey/TMC Athletics)
Amherst’s last defeat came on March 19, 2016, when Thomas More eliminated the Mammoths in the NCAA Division III Final Four.
“I thought we showed a lot of resiliency tonight,” said Thomas More head coach Jeff Hans. “It was tough all night, and we haven’t had too many of those nights. But we fought all night, and I couldn’t be more proud of them.”
Emma McCarthy paced Amherst on Friday with a game-high 19 points and nine rebounds. The Mammoths entered the game as the nation’s top defensive team and held Thomas More to 32.7 percent shooting from the field. The Saints came into Friday’s showdown No. 1 nationally in field-goal percentage at .490 and No. 2 in scoring at 86.2 points per game.
The Amherst defense also limited Thomas More to just 2-for-14 shooting from 3-point range. The Saints (30-2) were sixth nationally in 3-pointers made per game (8.7) going into the Final Four.
Madison Temple scored 14 points and grabbed seven rebounds to lead Thomas More, which watched its 29-game winning streak end. Taylor Jolly added nine points for the Saints, who had not lost since a 61-58 setback at Rochester (N.Y.) on Nov. 18.
Trailing 40-32 in the third quarter, Thomas More scored seven unanswered points to pull to within 40-39 on Temple’s 3-pointer with 16 seconds left on the clock. Amherst’s Cam Hendricks, however, responded by draining a 3-pointer just before the buzzer to extend the Mammoth lead to 43-39 going into the final frame.
“We had [the lead] down to one, and Hendricks hit that big three at the end of the quarter,” Hans said. “It swung the momentum.”
Said Temple: “She (Hendricks) stepped up and made a big shot, and it kind of deflated us a little.”
Amherst began the fourth quarter with an 8-2 spurt to build a 51-41 cushion and controlled the remainder of the game. The Mammoths shot 51.2 percent from the field and won the rebounding battle by a 33-29 count.
“I’m really proud of my team and how they handled all of Thomas More’s runs,” said Amherst head coach G.P. Gromacki. “The score does not reflect how close this game was.”
Madeline Eck added 11 points for Amherst, while teammate Hannah Hackley chipped in 10 points. The Mammoths also held Thomas More All-American guard Abby Owings to just two points on 1-for-12 shooting from the field.
Owings, a senior and a Simon Kenton High School graduate, entered Friday’s contest averaging 14.9 points per game. She finished her career as Thomas More’s all-time leading scorer with 1,789 points.
Thomas More senior forward Nikki Kiernan ended her career by scoring seven points and grabbing six rebounds. Kiernan also blocked a pair of shots and added two steals in her final game.
Thomas More won back-to-back NCAA Division III national championships in 2015 and ’16. The NCAA later forced Thomas More to vacate all 33 wins from the 2014-15 season, including the national title, for using an ineligible player.
