Cassie Askvig's bucket with under seven minutes remaining gave the University of Mary a lead it would never give back as the Marauders defeated the University of Minnesota Duluth 65-51 at the McDowell Activity Center Saturday evening. The Bulldogs had an eight-point lead in the third quarter disperse as U-Mary climbed back late in the third and would later take the lead 47-46. The Marauders tightened the gap in the Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference race between the two squads as it improved to 2-5 in the conference and 6-7 overall. The Bulldogs dropped to 7-3 overall and 4-2 in the NSIC. 

U-Mary scored 24 points in the fourth quarter, the most UMD has given up in any fourth quarter this season. The lead changed hands 10 times including three times in the fourth quarter alone. U-Mary defense confused the Bulldog offense in the fourth quarter. UMD scored only nine points and missed its last eight attempts from the field. The Bulldogs shot a season-low 28.8 percent from the floor.

All five UMD starters had at least seven points with junior forward Emma Boehm leading the Bulldogs with 10 points. Boehm, the Eden Prairie, Minn., native, has led the squad in scoring in the last two outings. She also had four assists which tied a career high she set back on Dec. 5, 2015 against Bemidji State. Askvig had a game-high 25 points and also pulled down a game-high 18 rebounds. Three Bulldogs each had five rebounds.

Sophomore guard Taylor Schneider knocked out a three-ball with four minutes left in the first quarter to give UMD a 13-5 lead. U-Mary would close the lead to one late in the quarter before Boehm drained a three of her own to end the first minutes of play.  The Bulldogs pushed their lead back out to eight again on a Boehm layup and lead for the entire quarter, taking a 27-26 lead into the half. Junior forward Katie Stark gave UMD another eight-point advantage when she drew the contact and delivered an old-fashioned three-point play the hard way. However, the Marauders got within one again and the Bulldogs couldn't answer with another run as U-Mary crawled ahead to finish off UMD on its monster fourth quarter.

The Marauders won the battle in the paint, outscoring UMD 38-18 and they blocked 12 bulldog shots.

UMD attempts to get the weekend split tomorrow against Minot State University. The Beavers and Bulldogs will square off at 2:00 p.m. in Minot, N.D.