Boston, Mass. - February 17, 2024 - The Springfield College women's basketball team secured the top seed in the upcoming New England Women's and Men's Athletic Conference (NEWMAC) Championship Tournament following a 73-71 win at Emerson on Saturday afternoon.

The win lifted Springfield, which was receiving votes in the most recent D3hoops.com National Poll, to 21-4 on the year as it is the second time in the last three seasons that the Pride had 21 regular-season victories.  Springfield earned a share of the NEWMAC regular-season title as it went 10-1 in conference play this season, marking the seventh overall NEWMAC regular-season title and first since 2014-15.

Angela Czeremcha (West Springfield, Mass.) delivered another monster double double with 18 points and 16 rebounds, while Jaelen Daubon (Hyde Park, N.Y.) poured in 18 points of her own.  Stefany Padula (Franklin, Mass.) was tremendous off the bench with 14 points as she canned all four of her attempts from beyond the arc.  Springfield finished the game with 21 offensive rebounds which resulted in 18 second-chance points.

Emerson jumped out to an 8-2 lead just over three minutes into the game, only to have Springfield respond with a 13-2 push over a three-minute span as a bucket from Claire Finney (Haverhill, Mass.) at 2:53 put the Pride on top 15-10. Padula would later drill a triple at the horn to help Springfield to a 21-14 lead to close out a quarter where each team shot 45% from the field. 

Both offenses continued to be efficient in the second, shooting at a 50% clip, but it was the Pride's 13-6 run in the opening 4:30 that allowed the advantage to balloon to 34-20 on a jumper by Kassidy Carrano (West Haven, Conn.).  The Pride would maintain a 42-31 cushion at the break, with Daubon scoring 13 points in the first half. 

Springfield maintained a double-digit lead the entire third quarter, with a jumper by Lindsey Laughlan (Ellington, Conn.) in the final seconds extending the advantage to 60-45.  However, Emerson would outscore Springfield by a 26-13 margin in the final quarter and used a late rally to make things interesting. With the score 70-68 in favor of the Pride with under a minute to play, Daubon came up huge with a inside bucket, and later tacked on a free throw inside 10 seconds to give Springfield a five-point lead as it held on for the conference win. 

The Pride will face eighth-seeded Salve Regina in the NEWMAC Championship Quarterfinals on Wednesday night in Blake Arena at 7 pm.

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