ELON, N.C. – On Sunday afternoon, the Elon University women's basketball team conquered the No. 1 team in the conference, North Carolina A&T, in thrilling comeback fashion. Following the miraculous upset, the locker room erupted with cheers and pure jubilation. Head coach
Charlotte Smith displayed a beaming smile with her arms extended as she accepted her soggy fate.
This celebration followed an emotional roller-coaster of a fourth quarter in which Elon mounted an 11-0 run in the final two minutes. Redshirt sophomore guard Raven Preston's flamethrower final frame willed the Phoenix back from a double-digit deficit to a phenomenal final home game victory.
Preston missed only one shot in the final period, scoring 20 points and drilling four threes when her team needed her most. Her 31 points and five triples are career bests.
"I just wanted to win," Preston said. "We all just wanted to win. We all came together and were like, 'This is the game.' We're going to do what we're supposed to do, it doesn't matter who scores the ball, as long as we win."
From the tipoff, NC A&T commanded the tempo, holding an eight point lead heading into the fourth quarter. To begin the final period, former Phoenix Ajia James – who transferred to the intra-conference rival at the end of last season – sank a jumper at the 9:09 mark, stretching the Aggies' lead to 10.
From there, Preston's inferno began. The next possession, she knocked down her first three of the quarter. The next trip down, she scored a layup, and followed that up with another three, her second bomb and 8th point in three straight offensive possessions.
As Preston began to habitually put the ball in the basket every time it left her hands, NC A&T responded. Preston's third three of the quarter finally made up some ground on the Aggies, slicing the lead to five. However, NC A&T again extended its advantage to nine with 3:52 left in regulation. Unfortunately for the Aggies, the Elon defense put a lid on the basket for the rest of the game.
At the 2:18 mark, the Aggies walked the ball into the Phoenix half court, up eight with the win in reach. That was until an errant Aggies pass sailed out of bounds, giving Elon possession. Then, freshman guard Jayda Angel missed a jumper, and the arena deflated for about one second, before Preston grabbed the offensive rebound and scored the putback layup.
After another Aggie turnover, Elon regained possession, this time down six. On an out-of-bounds play, Preston relocated from inbounding on the baseline to the right corner, firing again from long range. Her three swished loud enough for everyone in the arena to hear.
With the clock ticking below one minute, the Phoenix needed a stop desperately. And guess who ripped the ball from the Aggie ball handler? At :44 seconds remaining, the entire Schar Center rose to their feet, with the Phoenix coming down the court with a chance to tie the game. Preston drew a foul, sinking her biggest and most open shots of the night. The Phoenix trailed by one with :41 seconds left.
In the most crucial possession of the game for NC A&T, the Aggies fired a wing three, clanging off the rim and into the scorching hands of Raven Preston. Elon would have a chance to win it in regulation, and coach Charlotte Smith called her final timeout with :13 seconds left. The next 10 seconds did nothing but move the ball from being inbounded to the other side of the court. Three seconds left, and the improbable victory seemed like an almost.
Preston, inbounding again, did not receive the ball back for the final shot. Instead, sophomore guard Maraja Pass dribbled through two defenders and threw up a three. Pass' game-winning three clanged off the rim, but the referee's whistle evoked a booming roar from the Schar Center crowd.
Pass, whose fingerprints were all over in the fourth quarter, sank the first two of her three free throws, capturing the first lead for the Phoenix since 6:48 in the first quarter.
NC A&T could not get a shot off with the sole second remaining on the clock, and the second celebration of the day began.
The first celebration did not feature the Phoenix jumping up and down together. Instead, it was a tearful pregame honoring of the six seniors. Iycez Adams, Regina Walton, Ruby Willard, Hannah Dereje, Kamryn Doty and Preston walked to center court with their families and loved ones, receiving flowers and a portrait.
The final celebration of the day featured coach Smith being drenched by her players. Smith has kept the team level at tumultuous moments in the season, bouncing back from a 40 point loss Friday with a personal postgame celebration shower from her players on Sunday.
"When you know who you are, you know who you are," Smith said. "We are the Phoenix, and that's what we do. We rise from the ashes. And that last game, we got burned, and there were a lot of ashes, but you look back and then you focus forward."
Smith and her players will focus forward to the final two games of the 2024-25 regular season. The team travels to Boston, Massachusetts for a 7 p.m. matchup against Northeastern (2-23, 1-15 CAA) on Thursday, March 6 before heading to Monmouth for the season finale on Saturday, March 8 at 2 p.m. The CAA tournament will run from March 12-16, and the Phoenix aims to bring its trend of fourth-quarter comebacks.
'Rising Phoenix' is a student-led initiative to cover Elon Athletics. Through innovative content creation and storytelling, Elon University students will have the opportunity to highlight the moments, people and events that make an impact, leveraging the athletic department's various web and social media platforms for distribution. Follow Rising Phoenix on X (@EURisingPhoenix) and Instagram (@elonrisingphoenix). Interested in joining this initiative as a content creator (video, graphics, writing, storytelling, or more)? Contact Chase Strawser at cstrawser@elon.edu.
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