Jan. 2, 2011

Final Stats

SEATTLE, Wash. -- Seattle shot over 50 percent from the field in both halves and held the Navy women's basketball team to a field goal percentage of 33.9 percent for the game to defeat the Midshipmen, 62-50, Saturday night at the Connolly Center in Seattle, Wash.

"I think you have to first credit Seattle," said Navy head coach Stefanie Pemper. "I thought their half court defense was terrific. They played some defenses we don't typically see during the year, and they also really pressured us in their man defense. They force teams into a lot of turnovers and that affected our confidence and rhythm on offense. We didn't shoot the ball well. Some of our shots were rushed, but I thought we had enough good looks at the basket. We didn't execute as we needed to."

Navy (6-7) started the game slowly, falling behind by 10 points at 15-5 just seven minutes into the contest. After eventually trailing by as many as 12 points at 19-7, the Mids slowly pulled back to within four points of Seattle (5-11) at 24-20 before going into halftime trailing by the same amount at 29-25.

While the Mids may have started the game slowly, they had a great start to the second half. Navy scored the first seven points of the half as part of a 10-2 run to take a 35-31 advantage a little more than three minutes into the frame. Alix Membreno (Fr., Loxahatchee, Fla.) scored back-to-back field goals for the Mids to start the half, with her two buckets coming after steals by Jade Geif (Fr., Lakeview, Minn.) and Angela Myers (Sr., San Antonio, Texas), respectively. Cassie Consedine (Sr., Bartlesville, Okla.) then drilled a three-point field goal to cap the 7-0 run. Amani Butler made a pair of free throws for Seattle, which was followed by Consedine's fourth triple of the game that made the score 35-31.

Seattle battled back and regained the lead at 36-35 than, after the score was tied at 36-36, the Redhawks scored the ensuing four points to take a 40-36 lead. Audrey Bauer (Fr., Lake Zurich, Ill.) made a three-point field goal to pull Navy back to within one point of the Redhawks at 40-39, but that was followed by five quick points from Seattle that made the score 45-39.

A Geif field goal narrowed the margin down to four points at 45-41, but then Seattle scored points on eight of its next 10 possessions to open up a 58-46 advantage with 3:23 left to play.

"We couldn't stop Seattle in the second half," said Pemper. "You have to give them the credit. Their offense has a lot of moving parts and it was hard for us to keep up with that."

Seattle shot 50 percent from the field in the first half and 52.4 percent in the second half. Conversely, Navy connected on just 34.5 percent of its field goal attempts in the opening 20 minutes of play and 33.3 percent of its shots over the last 20 minutes.

Part of the reason for Navy's low overall shooting percentage was its 7-of-31 (22.6%) effort from outside of the three-point line. Seattle would shoot 31.3 percent (5-of-16) from beyond the arc in the game.

Seattle also doubled the number of free throws made and attempted than the respective totals for the Mids (11-of-18 compared to 5-of-9), and held a 36-32 advantage over the Mids on the glass.

Consedine's 12 points led the Mids, with Geif adding 11 points and seven boards to the Navy effort. Myers, who entered the game leading the Mids in scoring with an average of 14.2 points per game, was held scoreless in 36 minutes of playing time. It is just the third time in her 105-game career that she was held without a point, and the first time for such an occurrence since the 18th game of her career.

"I'm bummed because of some of the progress we had made coming into tonight," said Pemper. "I liked our effort, just as I did against Air Force (a 63-62 win two days ago in Colorado Springs, Colo.). I think we took some steps forward on this trip. I think we became closer as a team.

"But right now we are just not all on the same page. We were for maybe 15 minutes tonight. Our court leadership needs to improve. And we are just not stable at the point guard position right now. I do think Kara Pollinger (Fr., Fort Gay, W.Va.) played well for the second straight game. I was pleased with that she gave us again."

Leading all players in scoring on the night was Seattle's Salena Dickerson, who made 8-of-11 attempts from the floor on her way to tallying 22 points.

Navy will return to Annapolis for its final game prior to the start of conference play Tuesday night when the Midshipmen play host to Howard.