ITHACA, N.Y. – Senior forward Nia Marshall finished with 19 points and freshman guard Samantha Widmann provided 14 points off the bench, nearly all of which came in the second half, to help the Big Red women's basketball team overcome a slow start in its 58-50 victory over Loyola this afternoon in Newman Arena. With the win, Cornell is off to its first 2-0 start since 2013-14.
 
"It was an ugly game, but you have to find different ways to win," said Dayna Smith, the Rebecca Quinn Morgan '60 Head Coach of Women's Basketball. "So I'm proud of the effort. We scrapped through it. It was sloppy. Which is very uncharacteristic for us to have that many turnovers and mental mistakes but that's things we can correct. And it's always better to learn from a win than from a loss."
 
Marshall also finished with a team-high six rebounds and produced two steals.
 
Widmann, seeing the first minutes of her collegiate career, went 4-of-6 from the floor, grabbed four rebounds, had one block, one steal, and drew a defensive charge just moments after stepping on the court for the first time. In total, 13 of her 14 points came in the second half, scoring nine points in the final 3:32 of the third, as Cornell broke a 29-29 tie with an 11-6 run to take a lead it would not relinquish.
 
Megan LeDuc also finished in double-figures with 12 points, while Nicholle Aston chipped in seven points and five rebounds. Kerri Moran handed out a team-high five assists, just one fewer than the assist total for the Greyhounds.
 
Loyola (1-1) was led by the team's lone returning starter, Bri Betz-White, who finished with 20 points on 6-of-9 shooting. Forward Lauren Daugherty tallied a game-high nine rebounds.
 
After a first half in which Cornell shot less than 20 percent from the floor (4-23; 17.1), the Big Red knocked down 11-of-24 shots (45.8) over the final 20 minutes to finish at 31.9 percent overall for the game. Cornel hit just one three-pointer in the contest (1-7) and turned the ball over 21 times.
 
"We were disappointed in our lack of focus," said Smith. "We were making a ton of metal mistakes. Our shots weren't falling and we were getting down … You can't do that. It was effecting the next possession. So we needed to focus in on our offenses and take advantage of what Loyola was giving us. We did a better job of that in the second half."
 
The Greyhounds were far more consistent over the four quarters, but shot just 34.7 percent (17-49) from the floor for the game, and just 21.7 percent (5-23) from beyond the arc. Loyola finished with 26 turnovers off 11 Big Red steals.
 
Cornell held the 37-34 edge on the boards, including 11 offensive rebounds that led to 12 second chance points.  
 
The Big Red will hit the road for the first time this season, as it travels for a mid-week contest at Colgate on Wednesday, Nov. 16 at 7 p.m.