GOSHEN, Ind. - The Goshen College women's basketball team came out in full force for their season opener and the head coaching debut of former Maple Leaf
Tyra Carver. Goshen dominated Michigan-Dearborn 116-63 on day one of the Ruth Gunden Classic.
Goshen's 116 points are the second-most in program history, only behind a 123-27 win against IU-Northwest on November 9, 1999. The team's 34 assists were just short of the 38 from a 112-24 win against IU-East in 1999.
The first ten minutes of the game were Goshen's most supreme. The Leafs put up 40 points in the first quarter and allowed just 12. They made 14 of 22 field goal attempts in the quarter and went 4-6 from three. The 40 points in the quarter are the most in any quarter since women's basketball switched to quarters for the 2015-16 season.
The 19 Goshen points in the second quarter seemed minuscule compared to the first, along with the 31 and 26 points put up in the next two quarters. Goshen finished the game by shooting 50% from three - the first time they had done that since shooting 50% against Marian on February 17, 2018. The Maple Leafs shot 55.7% from the floor, the team's best mark since shooting 58.6% against Huntington on February 23, 2016.
Goshen had two 25-point scorers -
Paula Ferrer Nolla and
Zion Neat. The totals were both GC career highs for the players. Ferrer Nolla scored 26 points all season last year. She made eight field goals in her 108 minutes played in 2023-24. Comparatively, she made 11 field goals in 24 minutes tonight. Ferrer Nolla was 11-12 from the field with ten rebounds, three blocks and a steal. The last GC player to make 11+ field goals with one miss or fewer was Gabby Williams. At Trinity International on November 14, 2015, she went 12-13.
Neat was 9-12 and went 6-6 from the free-throw line.
Emme Boots scored 12,
Lillian Null had 11 and
Kyla Foster put up ten points. All 11 players that played played at least 14 minutes and had at least one made field goal and three points. Foster and Null had eight assists apiece.
#22 Saint Francis beat Cornerstone in the first game of the night, 72-48. Goshen faces Cornerstone on Saturday at 3:00 pm after Saint Francis and Michigan-Dearborn play at 1:00 pm.
