LAWRENCEVILLE, N.J.. – The Fairfield University Women's Basketball team opened up the 2025 calendar year with a dominating win at Rider, taking down the Broncs 69-37. Fairfield's quintet of road runners in Cyanne Coe, Meghan Andersen, Emina Selimovic, Lauren Beach, and Raiana Brown combined for 51 of those points as the Stags tallied 44 points in the paint.
 
"Both of Raiana [Brown] and Cy [Coe] were great," Head Coach Carly Thibault-DuDonis said. "We challenged them before the break that they have more to give in a lot of ways. Cy continued to find how she could impact the game defensively and Rai did a great job understanding where she could get interior touches in motion. This is a game where we knew our road runners were going to have an opportunity to kind of wear them with our depth and I think we did that."
 
Brown led the Stags with 16 points while going 6-for-7 from the floor and hitting three of her four free throw attempts.
 
Coe was equally as impressive with a 6-for-9 showing to finish with 12 points and hauling in a new career-high with six rebounds.
 
Coe ended her day with a highlight reel layup, with a foul, to increase the Fairfield lead to 28 in the fourth quarter.
 
Beach also set a new season-high with eight points while going 4-for-7 from the field and chipped in three rebounds and an assist.
 
Nicoletti-Leite, who entered play second in the MAAC in assists, added six more to her tally on just one turnover.
 
The Stags started the game on fire, shooting 50 percent overall and a blistering 61 percent from 2-point range in the first half to grab a commanding 17-point lead.
 
Coe was at the forefront of their dominant post play as the road runner connected on all four of her shot attempts and recorded eight points, four rebounds, and an assist in her seven minutes in the first half.
 
Fairfield went on a 7-0 run towards the end of the second quarter to open up a 13-point lead after four-straight points by Andersen.
 
In total, the Stags shot 48 percent in the contest with eight different players tallying six or more points. The Stags dominated the post, out-rebounding Rider 38-23 while having a 44-18 margin for points in the paint.
 
Fairfield, who improved their conference record to 2-0, will look to continue their momentum when they host MAAC newcomer Merrimack on Saturday at 2pm.