The women’s basketball team lost its last game of the season at American University two weeks ago in the Patriot League tournament quarterfinals, 70-46.

The game began evenly, as both teams made the most of their early attacks. The Eagles, however, opened a five-point gap at 11-6 and didn’t look back thanks in part to their dominance in rebounding and turnover differentials. The Raiders were unable to break their opponents’ stingy defense and only converted 26.9 percent of their shots in the half, which ended at 40-15 in American’s favor.

The second 20 minutes were a different story, though. Colgate became the more aggressive team and tried everything possible to reduce the gap. Senior captain Caitlin Gillard showed why she was the team’s leader by scoring a season-high 19 points and a grabbing a game-high five rebounds. Colgate improved its shooting percentage to 34% overall, but that was nowhere close to American’s 53.1 % mark. First-year Sami Kozlowski once again proved her skill and assured the fans that the Raiders’ future is in good hands by scoring eight points. Sophomore Katie Garman and first year Krista Moser each added seven points. Head Coach Pam Bass was pleased with the team’s second-half performance.

“I thought we did a great job in the second half,” she said. “It was an excellent experience to get a feel of what the Patriot League is like.”

The Raiders finished the season with just a single win out of thirty games. However, Bass is not worried because she is more concerned with rebuilding the team for the near future.

“The amount of growth that this team had this year is tremendous,” she concluded.