Ashland, WI - MLC women's basketball followed the men's close loss and looked to snag one road win for the Knights on their road trip up to Northern Wisconsin. The Knights fell to Northland in their previous game in early December. The difference proved to be a double-double performance from Miranda Wagner who put up 23 points and 10 rebounds. This time around, Wagner showed that that performance wasn't a one-time fluke and put up 30 points in Saturday's contest to lead the Lumberjills to a
70-50 win over MLC.
Northland shot 38 percent as a team in the first half from 3-point territory and utilized their backcourt's shooting ability early on. The Knights would shoot 1-of-9 (25 percent) from beyond the 3-point line, but still played hard and found decent looks inside the paint, especially from
Emma Nelson. The junior picked up her fourth double-double of the season with 15 points and 12 rebounds on 38.9 percent shooting from the field. MLC entered the break down 37-25, despite the lack of outside shooting and looked to slow down the Northland offense in the second half.
To start the second half, MLC guarded the perimeter much better, but the Lumberjills found other ways to score the ball and converted at the free throw line after driving hard to the basket. Northland ended the third quarter with a 54-40 advantage and would ultimately seal the victory up after holding MLC to just one field goal in the fourth quarter. Despite just scoring one field goal, the Knights shot 8-of-10 from the charity stripe in the final quarter. MLC was unable to stop Wagner from scoring inside and out and had a difficult time keeping Bailey Wynn off the glass, who finished with 14 points and 11 rebounds.
The Knights have been successful over the years against Northland and even with the loss go to (18-8) all-time against the Lumberjills.
MLC (8-13, 1-9) will return to action on Friday, February 10th, when they face UM-Morris on the road. The Knights will look to avenge their previous loss to the Cougars which came a couple weeks ago.
