Recipe For Success Serves Up Another Delicious Dish

MOORHEAD, Minn. (01/29/22)---Concordia might want to laminate the recipe for success they've found in the past four games.

The Cobbers followed that recent recipe against St. Benedict on Saturday and came away with a 64-46 win.

Concordia has now won four straight games and have outscored their opponents by a considerable margin in the second half. The Cobbers broke open their game with the Bennies by posting a 39-21 advantage in the final 20 minutes of play and won by those 18 points.

On Wednesday, Concordia trailed 39-33 at the break, but then outscored Macalester 34-19 in the second half to earn their first road win of the year.

The 4-game win streak ups the Cobbers' overall record to within one game of .500 on the year. CC is 7-8 in all games and 7-6 in the MIAC. The victory also continues the team's success at home in 2022. The Cobbers haven't lost in Memorial Auditorium since the new calendar year and are 6-1 at home for the entire season.

St. Benedict has its 3-game win streak come to an end. They are now 11-6 overall and 8-6 in league play.

The Bennies are one game ahead of CC for fifth place in the conference standings.

St. Ben's had the better of the play for most of the first half. They built a 6-point lead at 13-7 with 2:09 to play but then the Cobbers responded with a pair of layups from Emily Beseman and a 3-pointer from Maddie Guler to put together a 7-0 run and grab a 14-13 lead heading into the second quarter.

Neither team had more than a 3-point lead in the second quarter which featured three tie scores. The final tie came in the final minute of the half when CSB connected on a pair of free throws to bring the score level at 25-25.

The game changed at the end of the third quarter and start of the fourth. CC trailed 34-33 with 3:30 left in the third period, and then went on a 7-0 run to push the lead to six at the break. The lead would get pushed to 16 points in the first 3:59 of the fourth quarter. The Cobbers went on a 15-5 run to extend the lead to 55-39 and cruised to the finish line for the 18-point win.

Concordia's defense tightened in the second half and held St. Benedict to only 28.0% (7-for-25) shooting from the floor and 18.2% (2-for-11) from outside the arc. CC also forced nine turnovers in the second half.

On the offensive end, the Cobbers connected on 57.1% (12-for-21) of their attempts from the floor and shot 42.9% (3-for-7) from distance.

Concordia had three of its starters finish with at least 12 points. Mary Sem was 9-for-15 from the floor and finished with 22 points. She also had five rebounds and four assists.

Guler, the team's sophomore point guard, went 4-for-7 from outside the arc and came away with a season-high 14 points. Guler hadn't scored more than four points in the team's first 11 games of the year, but has had at least eight points in three of the last four contests.

Beseman added 12 points to go along with three assists and two steals.

Freshman Symone Beld led the team in rebounding for the fourth time in the last six games. She grabbed seven boards and has come away with at least five boards in three of the last four games.

UP NEXT: Concordia will look to continue cooking from the recipe of success cookbook when they play at St. Olaf on Wednesday, Feb. 2 at 5 p.m.