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The No. 12 ranked University of Wisconsin-Whitewater women's basketball team erased a deficit thorugh three quarters and took the lead for good midway through the fourth quarter Thursday afternoon in a 55-51 victory against No. 8 Amherst (Mass.) in the semifinals of the NCAA Division III Championship at UPMC FIieldhouse in Pittsburgh, Pa.
 
With the win, the Warhawks (28-4 overall) advance to the national championship game, which is set for this Saturday at 1 p.m. Central Time against the winner of Thursday night's Hope/Trine game. Saturday's title game will air live on CBS Sports Network.
 
In the fourth quarter, a pair of free throws by Aleah Grundahl (DeForest, Wis./DeForest) with 5:42 on the clock broke a 46-46 tie and gave UW-W a two-point lead. She converted a layup on the next possession to force a timeout by the Mammoths (25-4).
 
UW-Whitewater's advantage was cut to one at the 2:24 mark before Yssa Sto. Domingo (Streamwood, Ill./St. Edward) knocked down a 3-pointer from the left wing to make it 53-49 with 2:03 left.
 
Amherst drew to within 53-51 with just under one minute to play. The two teams traded empty possessions before a foul was committed against Kacie Carollo (Whitewater, Wis./Whitewater), who stepped up to the free throw line and knocked down both shots to make it a four-point game with three seconds to play.
 
The Mammoths missed a 3-pointer at the buzzer, sending the Warhawks and their energetic crowd into a frenzy.
 
Grundahl led all scorers with 18 points, including 8-of-10 from the free-throw line, and added seven rebounds. Carollo tallied 11 points, nine rebounds and four assists, and Maggie Trautsch (Sun Prairie, Wis./DeForest) tallied 10 points off the bench.
 
UW-Whitewater held Amherst to 31.3 percent shooting from the floor, including 3-of-17 in the fourth quarter, and knocked down 14-of-16 at the free-throw line on the other end.
 
Neither team led by more than one possession until the 3:23 mark of the first quarter, when the Mammoths took a 13-9 advantage. The Warhawks scored six of the next eight points as Trautsch tied the game with a driving layup with 2:06 remaining. Amherst held a two-point lead heading to the second.
 
UW-W started the second quarter on an 8-1 run, capped by Rebekah Schumacher's (Whitewater, Wis./Whitewater) 3-pointer with 7:35 on the clock, to take a 23-18 lead. The two teams exchanged buckets before Trautsch gave UW-Whitewater a 27-25 advantage heading into halftime.
 
Amherst tied the game on a 3-pointer just over two minutes into the third quarter and, after a layup by Johanna Taylor (Wauwatosa, Wis./East), took a 34-33 lead at the midway point of the period.
 
The Mammoths' lead increase to three before the Warhawks rallied with a 6-0 run capped by Carollo's steal-and-layup with 2:53 left in the quarter. UW-W trailed by three by the end of the period.
 
Trautsch's 3-pointer just over three minutes into the fourth tied the game and set up Grundahl's go-ahead free throws.