Keystone College Towers Over Women’s Basketball

(LaPLUME, PA)  St. Joseph's College women's basketball lost their fourth straight game falling short to Keystone College, 70-45 in a non-conference match last night.  The Lady Bears drop to 6-8 and Keystone improves to 4-4.

The Lady Giants jumped out to a 10-0 lead connecting on four of their first seven shots.  A layup from Kristin Binckes(Brooklyn, NY / St. Saviour) at the half's midpoint cut the deficit to 4 at 17-13, but Keystone went on a 17-0 over the next six minutes to extend their lead to 21, the largest of the half. 

Facing a 20-point deficit at halftime, the Lady Bears kept the game even for the beginning of the half and the offense came alive stringing together a 10-0 run with Tara Gleason (Queens, NY / Stella Maris) accounting for 5 points during the run to trail by only 13.  Keystone responded with a 10-3 run of their own to bring the lead back over 20.  St. Joseph's would not be able to cut into the lead any further and ultimately fell 70-45.

Keystone dominated the boards and inside play holding 51-23 rebounding advantage and scoring almost half of their points from inside the paint.  The Lady Bears committed six fewer turnovers (20-14), however the Lady Giants were opportunistic converting the miscues to 22 points as opposed to St. Joseph's 9.

Senior Melissa Velez (Queens, NY / Mary Louis) led the Lady Bears in scoring for the second straight game with 9 points and dishing out three assists.  Freshman Joanna Marciniec (Brooklyn, NY / Baruch) and Tara Gleason each added 7 points.

Ellen Fallon and Lean Simko paced Keystone College with 18 and 12 points respectively.  Yasmeen Bates grabbed a game-high 11 rebounds.

St. Joseph's has a day off before returning to action on Wednesday evening hosting Albertus Magnus (5-4) College at Brooklyn Technical High School.  Tip-off is scheduled for 7:30 PM.