Central Connecticut’s women’s basketball team was defeated at home by the Farleigh Dickinson University Knights in the last regular season game, 70-56.
Senior guard Belle Lanpher led the team in scoring with 17 points and added two steals. Sophomore guard Samora Watson followed Lanpher with 15 points.
With the loss, the Blue Devils are forced to play on the road for the 2024 Northeast Conference Women’s Basketball Tournament.
“We would love to have that number four seed,” Head Coach Way Veney said. “We would love to host, but that’s in the past and we have to let it go. We still have more basketball to play.”
Veney said it does not matter where the game is played. The preparation does not change.
With only eight players on the roster, the Blue Devils have grown tremendously in every aspect of the game.
“We have just learned so many things about ourselves,” Veney said. “I think that when the fans come to watch us, we really are a family. That’s the biggest thing to changing a culture. We always work hard; it’s just about working smarter.”
Anything can happen in basketball during March.
“No one expected us to be here. We were picked last to finish in the league,” Veney said. “We get to write our own story. It’s about what we do, everything we believed in, and that doesn’t change.”
The Central Blue Devils will take on the Merrimack Warriors at Hammel Court on March 11. The team is 1-1 against the Warriors.
Lanpher said the team is ready to play Merrimack with a chip on their shoulder.
“We want to win,” Lanpher said. We have to go to Merrimack. It’s a hard place to play, but we are going to go there and do business.”
Lanpher made it clear that the loss against Farleigh Dickinson was in the past.
“It’s done right now,” she said. “We talked about it. We’ll process it tonight and then tomorrow we are back at it.”
The only thing on the Blue Devils’ minds heading into the tournament is a ring.
“We want a championship,” Lanpher said. “We want to cut down the nets.”
