Kennedy and Walters come up clutch in Pride comeback win over William Penn

DUBUQUE, Iowa - Hosting a rematch against a familiar foe from just two weeks ago, the Clarke University women's basketball team earned a 69-67 win over William Penn University on Wednesday night in the Kehl Center.

Jumping to the final two minutes of the game, the Statesmen grabbed one of their largest leads of the game at a 66-60 advantage with 1:46 left on the clock before Zoe Kennedy hit a layup on the very next possession then Hailey Walters knocked down her fifth three pointer of the game to make it a one point game with just under a minute left in the game.

The Pride forced a missed shot and a Walters rebound but a hustle play from WPU's Kayla Jones forced a turnover and a CU foul with the shot clock off as they hit just one of their two free throws to make it a two-point game at 67-65 for Kennedy to go to her right and hit a contested shot to tie the game at 67-67 with 11 seconds left.

Without a timeout to advance the ball to the front court, William Penn rushed the ball up the floor and this time it was Jones who would lose the ball to Walters, allowing Clarke to call one of their remaining timeouts to get a front court inbounds play with 4.1 seconds left.

CU wouldn't even need to inbound the ball as an off ball foul was called on Dekota Smith, who was attempting to guard Kennedy coming around a screen and send the junior from Cedar Rapids, Iowa to the free throw line as she would knock down both of those free throws and the Statesmen's half court shot wouldn't come close, giving the home team the victory.

To get to that point, William Penn seemingly controlled the middle portion of the game, winning the second and third quarters by a combined 40-29 after trailing 18-11 after a quarter where Clarke only made seven shots from the field over that stretch including a putrid 2-for-15 (13.3%) in the second quarter to go from up seven to down a point at halftime.

The Pride needed every bit of scoring they got from Kennedy and Walters as the only members of the Clarke lineup to score in double figures as Kennedy scored a game-high 30 points, 16 of which came in the fourth quarter, while Walters hit her aforementioned five three pointers and two more two pointers on her way to 19 points on 7-of-11 (63.6%) shooting from the field as both players had five rebounds, Kennedy dished out seven assists, and they combined for three steals.

Despite dealing with foul trouble and fouling out in the fourth quarter, sophomore Reese Ryan tied a school record with seven blocked shot in the game, just one game after blocking six shots at Park last Saturday as the Lodi, Wis. native finished with four points and nine rebounds along with those seven rejections.

William Penn's leading scorer did most of her damage from deep as Laney Parker went 5-for-8 from three point range and added two free throws for a 17-point night ahead of two other double figure scorers in Neva'eh Diaz-Doolin's 13 points and Smith's 12 points as the lane opened up a bit late for WPU once Ryan had fouled out.

Now in the midst of their longest winning streak of the season at four games, the Clarke women's basketball team will host their Senior Day game at the Kehl Center on Saturday, Feb. 14 when Peru State College comes to Dubuque for a 12:00 p.m. CT scheduled opening tip.