The Marist Red Foxes defeated the Quinnipiac Bobcats 69-63 in the first MAAC match-up in Quinnipiac basketball history, in a game where foul shots made all the difference.

“Those free points were a big difference,” head coach Tricia Fabbri said. “We’ve got to learn to get our hands off and play defense.”

Marist went 29-34 from the line as opposed to Quinnipiac shooting 9-14 from the line, proving a major difference in the six point loss the Bobcats suffered. Yet overall, Quinnipiac outshot and defended Marist better.

“Our field goal percentage, defense overall, how we shot the ball [was] better than them,” Fabbri said.

In the first half, Marist jumped out to an early lead. The game was tied 8-8 with 14 minutes remaining when Marist went on a 12-2 run which put them up 20-10, led by sophomore guard Sydney Coffey. Quinnipiac had little success with its jump shots, missing all but two of the jumpers it took.

However, the Bobcats found success from the paint, scoring 14 of their 27 points from inside. Junior guard Jasmine Martin (Sicklerville, N.J.), who led all scorers with 13 points (7-8 FT, 3-10 FG), had three baseline drives that translated to baskets. Marist found a lot of their offense from defense, translating six steals and nine turnovers into 11 points. They led 33-27 at halftime. Sophomore guard Madeline Blais led Marist’s scorers with eight points and two 3-pointers.

Both teams came out on a scoring blaze to start the second half, scoring a combined 20 points in the first four minutes. Marist pushed its way through Quinnipiac’s defense for easy lay-ups and forced three shooting fouls in that same time.

Marist’s Coffey scored nine points in six minutes. Offensively, Quinnipiac’s three pointers were beginning to find the bottom of the bucket. Junior forward Samantha Guastella (Red Bank, N.J.) hit both of her threes and Martin put in one of her own. Despite that, Marist kept their lead, hitting 85.3 percent of the free throws they took.

Late in the half, Quinnipiac began chipping away at Marist’s lead. Little by little, the lead shrunk, but Quinnipiac was unable to surpass Marist. Quinnipiac was within one point twice, but Marist’s stellar foul shooting proved to be too much.  Quinnipiac fouled until the lead became too much, and Marist won their first MAAC match-up of the year.

Coach Fabbri immediately took blame on herself for the game.

“I was definitely uptight and tense for this,” she said at the beginning of the press conference, “and that transcended down to my team, because I thought we were really tight.”

Martin repeated her coach’s sentiments.

“Coach said we were tight, everyone was really anxious,” she said. “It was the first conference game, and everyone needed to settle down, and settle into the style they were playing and just play our basketball.”

The Bobcats take a week break for finals and then travel to Albany in a non-conference game on Dec. 15.