University of Maryland Baltimore County junior guard Michelle Kurowski matched her career high with 30 points and the UMBC women’s basketball team (8-8, 2-1 America East) cruised to a 55-38 victory over America East rival Binghamton Bearcats (9-7, 2-1 AE) recently at the RAC Arena. The Retrievers have now won seven of their last 10 games.
UMBC’s America East Player of the Game, Kurowski made a career-best 12 of 19 attempts, including three of seven from three-point range. She last scored 30 points on Dec. 5, 2008, against Navy, and she moved into 14th place on UMBC’s all-time scoring list with 1,044 career points. She is the first Retriever to score 30 points in a game since Carlee Cassidy tallied 33 on Jan. 28, 2009, at Boston University, and she is the second player in the America East to do so this season, joining the Terriers’ Alex Young, who scored 30 against Boston College in the season opener.
Kurowski made her first six shots and scored 13 straight points for the Retrievers, who took a commanding 20-8 lead midway through the first half. Binghamton made just four of its first 14 shots and committed nine turnovers in the first 12 minutes of the game.
UMBC led, 29-16, at halftime, and Kurowski had 16 points in the opening period.
The Bearcats scored the first five points of the second half in less than a minute of action to whittle their deficit to eight points, 29-21, before Kurowski sparked a 7-0 Retriever run that put UMBC up by 15.
Binghamton scored eight of the game’s next 10 puts to again cut it to single digits, 38-29, with 11:40 remaining, but a three-pointer by Kurowski made it a 12-point contest, and the Bearcats would get no closer, as UMBC held Binghamton scoreless for nearly five minutes while taking an 18-point lead.
The Retrievers shot 44.2 percent in the game while holding Binghamton to just 29.4 percent from the floor, the third time this season UMBC has held its opponent to under 30 percent shooting. In addition, it was the first time the Retrievers have allowed less than 40 points in a game since Feb. 1, 2006, also against Binghamton.
Kurowski was the 2008 Nassau County Player of the Year after averaging 21.9 points, seven rebounds, four assists and three steals per game. She was Long Island’s third all-time leading scorer with 2,581 points, which ranks 10th all-time in New York. She led the Comets to back-to-back county titles and was a six-year starter at Hicksville – where she also was All-County in volleyball and graduated seventh in her class. She says someday she’d like to become a sports psychologist.
