Augustana College

Box Score

The Augustana women’s basketball team picked the right time to break out of a lingering shooting slump as the Vikings rallied from a 12-point first-half deficit to claim an 82-73 win in the first round of the NSIC / Sanford Health Women’s Basketball Tournament Wednesday night at the Elmen Center.

The Vikings improved to 20-8 on the season as they won 20 games for the fifth time in the past six seasons. It also gave head coach Dave Krauth his 12th 20-win seasons in 20 years on the Augustana bench. Krauth also inched one game closer to 400 career wins. He now has 397 career victories.

Augustana, which had lost four of its previous five games, found itself trailing by 12 points, 38-26, with 2 minutes to play in the first half. From that point on, it was all Vikings as they found their shooting stroke that eluded them for the past two weeks.

The Vikings scored the last 5 points of the first half to cut Minnesota Duluth’s lead to 38-31. Augustana then outscored UMD (16-13) 13-3 to start the second half and take a 44-41 lead with 14:04 to play in the game.

Minnesota Duluth tied the game at 44-44 on a free throw by Jacquie Hartman and a basket by Michelle Stemper, UMD’s first field goal in 9 minutes, at the13:32 mark.

But Kristi Board drained a 3-pointer, her third of the half, with 13:15 on the clock to trigger a 10-3 run that put Augustana in front 54-47 with just under 10 minutes to play.

UMD stayed close, pulling to within 3 points at 56-53 with 7 minutes remaining, but the Vikings rattled off 7 unanswered points, capped by a 3-point play by Whitney Hofer, that energized the Vikings and the crowd of 441 fans.

Minnesota Duluth was still within 8 at 68-60, but Augustana iced the game by making 14 of 18 free throws in the final 2:26.

Augustana, which shot 36 percent from the field in the first half, connected on nearly 55 percent of its shots in the second period, making 12 of 22 attempts. The Vikings also found their range from the 3-point line as they shot 45 percent (9 of 20) from behind the arc in the game.

Minnesota Duluth, however, had the opposite results. After shooting 47 percent in the first half, the Bulldogs made just 11 of 37 shots (30 percent) in the second half. Similarly, UMD made just 5 of 18 3-point attempts.

Hofer and Amy Puthoff, playing in their final games at the Elmen Center, led the Vikings. Hofer collected her 10th double-double of the season with 21 points and 15 rebounds. She had 12 points and 11 boards at halftime. Puthoff scored a game-high 22 points. Megan Doyle added 12 points and 7 assists, while Board chipped in with 11 points, all in the second half.

Stemper paced UMD with 14 points off the bench. Jheri Booker and Monica Mayry each scored 12 points in the losing effort.

With the win, Augustana advances to Saturday’s semifinals where the Vikings will face Concordia University, St. Paul in Winona, Minn. Concordia upset top-seeded Minnesota State University, Mankato, 86-77 in overtime on Wednesday. In other first round games, Winona State, the No. 2 seed, beat Wayne State 79-61 and No. 6 seed St. Cloud State upended third-seeded Minnesota State Moorhead 61-48.