VILLANOVA, PA. – In women's basketball action on Thursday evening, the Villanova Wildcats tallied a 67-57 home win over the visiting Richmond Spiders. With the victory, the Wildcats improve to 5-1 on the year, while Richmond falls to 6-2 on the season.
The first quarter was a defensive battle with neither team able to get going offensively. Villanova was just 5-of-16 from the field in the opening stanza, while Richmond was 5-fo-14. Wildcat junior guard Lucy Olsen scored eight of her team's 11 first quarter points as the teams were tied at 11-11 after one quarter of play.

Villanova started the second quarter on an 8-3 run to take a 19-14 lead. The Spiders responded by scoring seven unanswered points to grab a 21-19 advantage with 4:50 remaining until halftime. 
The Wildcats took the momentum right back and ran off 11 straight points to finish the half and go to intermission with a 30-21 lead. Olsen scored five of the 11 points, while junior guard Kaitlyn Orihel drained a triple from the wing during the spurt.
Villanova held Richmond to just 32.1 percent from the field in the first half on 9-of-28 shooting. The Spiders did not attempt a first half free throw, while the Wildcats were 5-of-8 from the stripe.

A three-ball by junior guard Zanai Jones gave Villanova its biggest lead of the game at 41-28 with 4:59 to play in the third quarter. On the game's next possession, Richmond's Rachel Ullstrom drained a triple and the Spiders were back within 10 at 41-31. 
Richmond scored the final four points of the third quarter to slice the Villanova advantage to 45-37 after three periods. The Richmond points included a lay-up by Siobhan Ryan and two free throws by Maggie Doogan.
Following a Doogan short jumper that made it a 45-39 game, Orihel and junior Maddie Burke buried back-to-back threes to push the Wildcat lead back to double digits at 50-39. The Spiders answered with four consecutive points, before Villanova center Christina Dalce scored on an offensive rebound put back and Olsen connected on a pull-up jumper. The Olsen bucket gave Villanova a 54-43 advantage.

The Spiders made one final push and cut an 11-point Villanova lead, to 58-52 at the 3:41 mark.  Jones came up with a pivotal play for Villanova when she connected on a long two to increase the Villanova advantage to 60-52 with 3:10 to play. After neither team was able to score for the next 2:03, Jones made it a double-digit lead when she connected on two free throws with 1:13 remaining.

Villanova went 3-of-4 from the foul line and Bella Runyan scored on a lay-up to put the game away down the stretch.
In the win, Olsen led the way with a game-high 30 points on 12-of-25 shooting from the field. Dalce finished with a double-double of 12 points and 15 rebounds. Orihel added eight points and five rebounds off the bench.
Richmond was paced by Doogan with 18 points and Addie Budnik who had 13 points. Grace Townsend chipped in with 11 points, eight rebounds and six assists.

For the game , Villanova was 25-of-59 from the field (42.4%), 5-of-18 from three (27.8%) and 12-of-17 from the foul line (70.6%) while the Spiders shot 40.7 percent from the floor (22-of-54), 30.0 percent from downtown (6-of-20) and 87.5 percent from the charity stripe (7-of-8). Villanova owned a 37-33 advantage on the backboards. The Wildcats were charged with just nine turnovers.  

Villanova returns to action on Sunday, Dec. 3, with a road game at Columbia. Game time is set for 2 p.m.

NOTES: Tonight was just the second all-time meeting between the schools…Villanova finished the month of November winning four in a row…Lucy Olsen has scored 20 points or more in five of the six games this year…Tonight was Olsen's second career 30-point game… Christina Dalce has grabbed 39 rebounds in her last three home games…Villanova has won 27 of its last 29 home games…The Wildcats scored 17 points off of Richmond turnovers.