Lady Bears Take 10th At USCAA Nationals

UNIONTOWN, PA – The St. Joseph's College women's basketball team lost to St. Mary-of-the-Woods 55-40 on Friday afternoon, concluding their 2009-10 campaign with a 10th place finish in the 2010 USCAA National Tournament.

Sophomore Ashley McQuillan (Brooklyn, NY/St. Francis Prep) paced the Lady Bears with 18 points connecting on 8-for-19 from the field.  Freshman Teresa Mangan (Cleveland, OH/St. Joseph's) added 14 points, all coming in the second half, and led the Lady Bears in scoring for the tournament, averaging 15.3 points per game.  Junior Allison Kavanagh (Woodhaven, NY/Mary Louis) pulled down a career-high 13 caroms.  Freshman Janine Doran (South Ozone Park, NY/Archbishop Molloy) swatted away four shots.

Seventh ranked St. Mary-of-the-Woods (16-13) placed four players in double-figures, led by freshman Brittney Shaner's 16 points and sophomore Chelsea Barron's 11 point, 10 rebound double-double.  Rebecca Tracy scored 13 points and Whitney Allen added 10.

The Lady Bears went scoreless for eight minutes in the opening frame and dug themselves a 23 point deficit, 31-8, with 6:06 on the clock.  A McQuillan jumper ended the drought and St. Joseph's attempted to start their long road back, trailing by 17 at intermission.

St. Joseph's opened the second stanza with a 13-6 run and cut the deficit to 10 points, 40-30, but consecutive turnovers in the open court leading to four points for the opponent stalled the Lady Bears rally and they would never bring the Pomeroys lead back to single digits.

The Lady Bears outshot St. Mary-of-the-Woods 31 percent to 29 percent, but the Pomeroys shot 71 percent (15-for-21) from the charity stripe while the Lady Bears scored no points from the line in four attempts.  In both losses for the tournament, St. Joseph's faced a 33-19 foul disadvantage accounting for 31 more opponent free throw attempts (48-17) which they converted at a 60 percent rate.

St. Joseph's concludes their season with a 16-14 record.