BOXSCORE

Like most coaches, Nicole Beauregard prefers to focus on one game at a time instead of getting caught up in looking at the big picture, but even Beauregard, The College at Brockport's third-year women's basketball coach, admitted she talked to her team about the importance of sweeping the weekend home series with Plattsburgh and Potsdam.

Beauregard and the rest of her Golden Eagles can breathe easier following Saturday afternoon's come-from-behind, 52-45 win over Potsdam inside Brockport's Jim and John Vlogianitis Gymnasium.

The win lifted Brockport (6-14 overall, 4-9) into sole possession of seventh place in the State University of New York Athletic Conference (SUNYAC) standings with five regular-season games left.

The top eight teams advance into the SUNYAC postseason tournament, which runs Feb. 22-26. Brockport is a full game up on No. 8 Plattsburgh (3-10 SUNYAC), 1 1/2 games ahead of No. 9 Fredonia (3-11) and two full games up on No. 10 Potsdam (2-11).

“It felt really good to get these two wins. I really don't like to talk about the big picture, but I felt these girls needed to hear that, they needed to hear that we were in a situation where they needed to battle for these two wins,” Beauregard said after the win.

“Yes, we have an opportunity to play more games, but I felt our home games was where we needed to focus our attention, and the girls did. They really battled hard today and weathered some big storms.”

What made Saturday's win all the more impressive was how Brockport weathered a pair of 10-0 runs against the Bears (3-17, 2-11).

Sophomore Sarah Alwardt (Rochester, NY/Greece Athena) recorded her second-straight double-double, and fifth of the 2010-11 season. A day after grabbing a career-high 16 rebounds, Alwardt snared 10 boards to go with her game-high 16 points for the Golden Eagles, which started slow and trailed 39-30 with 7:21 remaining.

But Brockport showed its resiliency and responded with a 14-3 run, capped by layups from junior Rachel Csakany (Schenectady, NY/Schenectady) and Alwardt to take a 44-42 lead. From there, Alwardt hit 5 of 6 free throws as Brockport clinched the win by hitting 10 of its final 12 free throws.

Csakany finished with seven points and nine rebounds and sophomore Ellen Story (Catskill, NY/Catskill) added 10 points and seven rebounds for Brockport, which outrebounded Potsdam 41-29.

“It was huge for us to win two in a row at home,” Alwardt said. “That momentum we had from Friday night's win carried over with us into today's game. Now we're going on the road and it's going to be huge for us to keep winning. We just built up so much confidence that we didn't have before.”

Brockport's defense clamped down and limited Potsdam to 32 percent shooting for the game (19 for 60), and just 2 of 12 shooting on its three-pointers. Brockport, meanwhile, shot 47 percent in the second half (9 of 19).