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The Miami Hurricanes handed the Syracuse Orange women’s basketball team its first home lost of the season, 84-71 in the Carrier Dome on Wednesday night. SU struggled from the field and only had two players score in double-digits versus the Hurricanes. This is first time SU has lost back-to-back games this season.
SU led 25-22 at the end of the first quarter, but gave up that lead 51 seconds into the second quarter and never led again. Miami outscored the Orange 23-12 in the second, then held a 39-34 advantage in the second half to coast to the win.
Miami had four players score in double-digits led by 21 points from Emese Hof. . Mykea Gray had 17, while Laura Cornelius chipped in 13. The team’s leading scorer, Beatrice Mompremier, had 12 points and 10 rebounds (all on the defensive end).
This was the second straight game that Syracuse shot worse than 20 percent from outside. After going 8-for-42 (19 percent) against Georgia Tech, SU was 5-of-32 against Miami. Despite struggling from three in the first half with just two makes, they doubled down on it in the second but to no avail. Syracuse shot just 12 free throws on the game, hitting 10.
Orange coach Quentin HIllsman addressed the disappointing result after the game:
“We have to evaluate what’s going. We just played a ranked team and we had one loss to a non-ranked team on the road. These are the moments that I know we’re good. Everyone is like ‘what’s wrong?’ It’s fantastic. 11 years ago, no one was saying ‘what’s wrong’ when we were 7-12. This is fantastic.”
That’s some nice optimism on a strange turn of events for the Orange, who’ve suddenly gone cold and can’t seem to get any effective offense going inside to counter it. Though there were some bright spots in this one: Tiana Mangakahia had a bounceback game with 12 points and eight assists, plus Kiara Lewis scored a team-high 16 and 10 players scored at least three points for SU. But only two players (Mangakahia, Lewis) scored in double digits.
SU is on the road next against Duke on Sunday as they try to right the ship. The Orange are just 3-3 in true road games this season, though they’re 3-1 in ACC road contests. Duke is also in last place at 0-5 in league play and 8-9 overall.