NEWARK, NJ—Freshman Camille Zimmerman scored a game-high 16 points and sophomore Tori Oliver added 15 for Columbia in a 45-38 women's basketball victory for the visiting Lions over NJIT Monday night in the Estelle and Zoom Fleisher Athletic Center.
 
Zimmerman scored 10 of her points in the opening half and Oliver got 11 of her points in the second half, as the Lions (6-8) got past the Highlanders (8-11) in a game where both teams had difficulty making shots.
 
Oliver scored six of her points in a pivotal 11-2 run by Columbia that turned a 29-29 tie at the 6:35 mark of the second half into a 40-31 lead with 4:18 left, following a layup by the Lion sophomore.
 
Victorious Columbia made 29 percent (14-of-49) of its shots from the floor for the game, while NJIT was unable to match its defensive success on the offensive end of the floor, connecting on 23 percent of its tries (15-for-65. Included in NJIT's total was 3-for-24 shooting from 3-point distance.
 
None of the Highlanders reached double-figure point totals, as Kim Tullis topped the NJIT scoring with nine points. The senior just missed a double-double after pulling down a personal career-best and team-leading 11 rebounds.
 
Leah Horton and Camerin Spahn followed Tullis on the scoring list with eight points each for the Highlanders. Spahn, a sophomore matched her career scoring high, first done at VCU on December 28, 2013.
 
Similar to the score, the total team rebounds were close, with Columbia coming away with a slender 43-40 edge. Lion senior Amara Mbionwu led all rebounders with 15 and Oliver and Alexa Giuliano grabbed eight rebounds each for the visitors. Horton, the NJIT sophomore, finished with 7 rebounds to follow Tullis in that department.
 
NJIT senior Nicole Maticka, who came in averaging 15 points over the preceding three games, did not break into the scoring column Monday night, but she notched a season-best 7 blocked shots, two shy of her career high. The product of Bratislava, Slovakia, raised her school-record career total of block to 205.
 
Although neither team shot well, they both took good care of the ball, with NJIT committing a season-low 6 turnovers. Indeed, it was the lowest turnover total in a game for NJIT in more than three years, since the Highlanders had five in a game at Navy on January 3, 2012. Columbia committed only 11 turnovers Monday night.
  
The game started slowly, with Horton's basket for NJIT at the 16:39 mark of the opening half representing the first score for either team. And it wasn't until a Zimmerman layup made it 10-6 for the visitors with 7:25 remaining in the half that either team reached double-digits. The Highlanders got their ninth and 10th points on a Martina Matejcikova layup that pulled her team to within a point of the lead at 11-10 at 5:27.
 
The first half ended with Columbia on top, 19-15, with 10 of the points coming from the freshman Zimmerman. Horton and Matejcikova shared the NJIT scoring lead with four points apiece at the break.
 
Senior point guard Alyssa Albanese opened the second-half scoring with a 3-pointer for NJIT, but Oliver answered with a jump shot and Giuliano nailed a three to put Columbia ahead by six, 24-18, 75 seconds into the final period.
 
The Highlanders had their best stretch of the game soon thereafter and they went up a point, 25-24, when Tullis drained a 3-pointer  with 12:12 left, capping a 7-0 NJIT run.
 
The teams exchanged points for a few minutes and Tullis made a pair of free throws to tie the score at 29-29 with 6:35 on the clock.
 
Columbia then made its 11-2 run that gave the Lions the upper hand over the final 4:18.
 
The Highlanders got within striking distance at 40-35 after a Spahn layup with 1:55 shwoing, but they missed their next six shot attempts—four from downtown—and could get no closer.
 
The game vs. Columbia was the first of four in a row for NJIT against teams from the Ivy League. The next two will be played in New England, with the Highlanders visiting Harvard on Sunday, the 18th, and then Brown two days later. The Harvard game is slated for a 2 pm tipoff.
 
The run of Ivy opposition ends on Saturday, January 24, when the Highlanders host Penn at 2 pm in the Fleisher Athletic Center.