As conference play starts to make the turn down the home stretch teams will have to find ways to win tough games both on the road and at home. That is exactly what the New Haven Chargers did as they snuck past the American International College Yellow Jackets 46-45 on Wednesday night at Charger Gymnasium. With the win the Chargers get back to five hundred at 8-8 in Northeast 10 conference play and one game below five hundred overall at 10-11. The Jackets fall to 5-11 in conference play and 7-14 overall on the season.
AIC jumped out of the gates early on the Chargers opening up a nine-point lead, 11-2, in the first seven minutes. New Haven struggled to keep the deficit manageable at times. The Chargers kept fighting and managed to claw their way back to only be down two at the half 24-22 in the defensive battle.
With both teams struggling to find some sort of rhythm on offense the defense proved to be the deciding factor. Neither offense was able to shoot over 35 percent from the field in the first half including shooting a combined 2-21 from three-point range.
In the first half the Chargers were lead by Dominique Stellmacher with 10 points, the only player in the game to hit double figures in the first 20 minutes of play. Helin Marte did her part as well grabbing 10 rebounds dishing out five assists and adding three points. The Yellow Jackets were lead by Michelle Lafond with six points. She was helped out by Rhea Pascal and Adriana Johnson who both added four for AIC in the first half.
The second half started off like the first half but it was the Chargers who were able to open up a four-point lead in the first five minutes, to take the lead 28-24. A lead that big seemed more like an eight or ten point lead with how both teams were playing defensively throughout. New Haven was able to hold the lead until the final 90 seconds when AIC pulled two with a pair of Adrianna Johnson free throws, 41-39. This was followed up with two more free throws by Sasha Lowery to make a four-point AIC advantage with just over a minute remaining in the game. After a Lowery turnover Jasmine Hardy converted both free throws to cut the Yellow Jacket lead in half. Less than five seconds later after another turnover by Lowery, Dominique Stellmacher hit a jumper to tie the game with 21 seconds left.
After an AIC timeout with ten seconds left, Adrianna Johnson drove the lane and hit a lay-up with six seconds left in the game to put the Yellow Jackets up two. With no timeouts remaining the Chargers were forced to go the length of the court. The Chargers inbound ball to Stellmacher brought up a running three pointer with under one second left to give New Haven a one point victory over AIC 46-45.
Dominique Stellmacher led the Chargers with 14 points and seven rebounds. Helin Marte finished one point and two assists shy of a triple double by going ten, nine, and eight. Yasmin Ither-Vicenty added eight points, seven rebounds, and seven steals.
