Women's Basketball

Syracuse downs the Seahawks for third consecutive victory

By Tyger Munn Dec. 12, 2022

Alaina Rice in Syracuse’s game against Wagner

Syracuse women’s basketball breezed to an 8-2 start to the season after a dominating 83-53 matinee win Sunday at home against Wagner. This is the Orange’s third win in a row as they extend their perfect home record to seven games. The Seahawks had no answer for Dariauna Lewis who scored 13 points, along with collecting 12 rebounds in the game. Saniaa Wilson also joined in on the fun, matching Lewis’ 13 points and snatching nine boards as well.

Alaina Rice scored the first basket of the game as the Orange got off to a 10-4 run to start the game. The Seahawks looked out of sync to start the contest, tallying a large number of turnovers in the first quarter.

Despite the turnovers, the Seahawks were showing effort in their perimeter defense, giving Syracuse problems with their outside game. Alex Cowan displayed some stout defense and had the Orange’s guards flustered when taking their jump shots. Unfortunately for Wagner, they could not capitalize from deep as well, leading to both teams shooting a combined 1-12 from the three point arc in the first half.

This forced the Orange to go in the paint, which worked wonders for them offensively. Lewis, Wilson and Asia Strong were living under the basket and gave the Seahawks limited chances to secure a possession.

Strong goes up for the put-back layup (photo by Sara Brinsfield)

The Orange outscored Wagner by 24 points in the paint during the 1st half as their bigs held down the offense until the team’s jumpers started to fall in the third quarter. Georgia Woolley had the honor of breaking the lid over the basket for Syracuse. Her shot energized the crowd as well. Syracuse used that energy to finish business the rest of the game as they marched to a 30 point victory

Teisha Hyman takes a strong drive to the hoop despite the charge attempt by Kem Nwabudu (photo by Sara Brinsfield)

The Orange took advantage of their massive lead to clear their bench and give more in-game reps to their reserves. They had every player that suited up for the game score at least two points, which is the first time this has happened for Syracuse this season.

Dariauna Lewis recorded her 4th double double of the season and her 6th game with over 10 rebounds.

“I just like being a part of this team,” said Lewis after the game. She also added that she doesn’t like to see her guards drop their heads after a miss, and how she crashes the boards to give them the same confidence as they had before they took the shot.

Lewis after the 30 point win (photo by Sara Brinsfield)

The increased physicality was not exclusive to just the forwards but also the guards, as they were a part of the game plan as well, according to Head Coach Felisha Legette-Jack. Coach Legette-Jack said that after scouting the Seahawks, the team noticed that the middle could be exploited by the Orange.

“They never adjusted to close the middle up at all and we just took advantage of it,” said Legette-Jack.

The Orange begin conference play Sunday, December 18th against Wake Forest. The Demon Deacons are riding their own four game win streak as Syracuse looks to keep their home record perfect on the season. The game will start at 12pm at the JMA Wireless Dome and can be seen on ACC Network.

About the reporter

Tyger Munn

On November 18th 1999, Tyger Munn was born in Queens, New York. He’s the only son to Gail and Tyrone Munn, two working class New Yorkers living in Queens.They eventually moved to a home in Deer Park, Long Island only an hour outside of New York City and would hammer 1 thing in him his whole life, humility and kind acts that wouldn’t be noticed. Throughout Tyger’s childhood sports would be a major part in his life, joining his community pee-wee football and baseball league at the age of 6. Unfortunately he wasn’t very fond of playing sports at first, a large part of that had todo with the commitment of sports, something he was too young to understand at the time; but due to his fathers past of playing professional football and the fear of disappointing him he kept playing. This eventually changed in 2008 when his mother landed a job with the New York Jets as a physical therapist. His mother would bring him to the team’s facility and would interact with the players who he took a liking too. While being around the players so much Munn made the decision to completely change his outlook on life, he now wanted to be a professional football player. He wanted to play wide receiver despite the fact he didn’t have raw talent to play the position like others. After training everyday with his father for years he had gotten good enough to start on his varsity team in high school. His high school team was very very bad but despite this Munn had enough traction individually to go to a prep school for his post-graduate year, Cheshire Academy in Cheshire, Connecticut. Munn was nervous at first, he was a very awkward and timid child growing up and was always afraid of expressing himself due to his low confidence in high school. Other people's opinion of him meant life or death to him,and in a new school with people he doesn’t know this ate away at him. He made friends but that didn’t help, he still was at major conflict with his inner self despite achieving his goal of landing a scholarship to college. He ended up committing to Merrimack College, a small school in northern Massachusetts who were transitioning into a D1 school. Merrimack wouldn’t test Munn’s mental stability, it destroyed it his first year at the school from all angles. Socially and athletically he had no place to be, his coaching staff didn’t take kindly to his slow start and would target him during film room meetings and in school he struggled to find his place. His first year in school was a miserabletime for him but stuck with it so his parents didn’t have to pay as much for school, he was willing to continue this just for them. He knew now that he wouldn’t make it to the NFL and this left him aimless just going to school to go. He registered for a T.V production class not thinking much of it, but after taking the course he found new motivation. He was on camera for a good portion of the class and felt different while on it, like a warm feeling of security while 50+ people were looking at him. He realized football was just to give him a sense of direction andpurpose in his early life but he now knew what made that, his love for entertaining people. Being under spotlights was something he lived for, those night games back in high school were exciting because he knew the whole town could see him; now it was just in front of a camera and mic and for the first time he felt like he had control. With this new sense of direction and confidence he decided he didn’t want to be regular, he wanted to go beyond that and have his name hold weight in this lifetime simply because he wanted it to. He decided to pursue creating a media company and being a media personality, but during school he didn’t feel as though he earned his way to do this. So during his senior year he applied to the Newhouse School and got in, much to the joy of his undergraduate teachers. What happens at Newhouse and after is still yet to be written, but he has no fear as to what's to come. He has extremely loftygoals and even some told him unrealistic goals, but he’s there to prove this bet on himself is correct and to prove his parents' trust is correct. What happens from here on is up to him but you can bet he’s been waiting