OTTAWA, Ont. – Crown the Carleton Ravens women’s basketball team queens of the OUA for the 2024 season.
The defending champions defeated the Queen’s Gaels tonight 63-55 to lift the Critelli Cup for a second straight year.
It’s only the team’s fourth OUA championship in program history, but the win means a lot to head coach Dani Sinclair.
“It feels good,” Sinclair said. “I’m just really happy for the athletes.”
One of Sinclair’s athletes played 39 of the game’s 40 minutes. Kyana-Jade Poulin worked tirelessly on defence to keep Queen’s prolific offence at bay.
She received special credits from her coach for her defensive efforts.
“She’s someone that doesn’t get enough credit. She guards the other team’s top scorer every night.” Sinclair said. “She’s the anchor of our defence without a doubt … We need to get her some more breaks. We need more people who play defence like that.”
Poulin’s hard work wasn’t in vain. The Ravens caught the Gaels on the back foot from the jump and they struggled to recover after starting the contest 2-14 from field goal range and 0-5 from beyond the arc.
But a team’s misery is their opponent’s glory.
The Carleton Ravens 8-0 start transfixed into a halftime scoreline that felt insurmountable. They led 36-18 until momentum shifted.
Turbulent Third-Quarter Sparks Queen’s Comeback Hopes
It appeared as if the opening play of the third quarter would summarize Queen’s night: The Gaels created a mismatch for veteran forward Bridget Mulholland in the paint, but her shot was blocked and she committed a foul trying to recover a loose ball.
But the rest of the quarter veered from that moment. The Gaels fought their way out of the slump, outscoring the Ravens 16-8 and bringing the game within 10.
“They were who they really are in the third quarter,” said Sinclair. “Queen’s settled down after halftime and that’s really more indicative of what they’re capable of and we know that — we talked about that coming out of the half.”
It was turnover after turnover, missed field goal after missed field goal. With every Raven’s mistake, the Gaels grew more and more confident.
It carried over into the fourth quarter. From the ashes Queen’s ascended, drilling its 16-point deficit down to two.
“I didn’t think our gameplan was great [in the first half],” Queen’s head coach Claire Meadows said.
Meadows elaborated that playing zone defence didn’t work out as she’d hoped, citing four possessions where Carleton hurt them.
“We switched back to player-to-player defence and at that point, our game started to tighten up a bit more,” Meadows said. “I thought that was their biggest difference in the game.”
The pressure of the moment and the too-close-for-comfort feeling sparked something in MVP Kali Pocrnic. She drilled back-to-back threes to ignite a new life in her team.
The Ravens bettered their performance and it was enough to seal out a win. The Ravens and the Gaels will return for next week as OUA representatives at the national U SPORTS Final 8 tournament.
