Final Stats

BALTIMORE, Md. â€"â€" The Navy women's basketball team was held to a season-low point total in a 51-38 loss to Loyola Wednesday night at Reitz Arena in Baltimore.

"Just as good plays can be contagious," said Navy head coach Stefanie Pemper, "so too can bad plays. The latter was the case this evening.

"Our focus at walkthrough today was not what it typically is for us. We can't think we are going to just show up and win a game."

Navy (8-8, 2-3 Patriot League) held a 14-13 lead over Loyola (4-11, 3-2) at the end of the first quarter. Neither team played well offensively in the second quarter, which ended with the Greyhounds taking a 22-18 advantage on the Mids at the half. Loyola slowly built up a 35-25 lead in the third quarter and led by at least eight points over the remainder of the game.

Navy's previous low for points scored in a game this year was 41 against Bucknell. The Mids also were held to season lows for field goals made (15), field goal percentage (27.3%) and three-point field goal percentage (17.4%).

"I credit Loyola's defense for much of the end result," said Pemper. "I can believe all of the turnovers they forced us into. We want to speed things up on defense, but it was Loyola that did the same thing to us.'

Navy's defense held Loyola to 35.8 percent shooting from the floor and the Greyhounds were 5-21 (23.8%) from beyond the three-point arc. The Mids did a fairly decent job on all Loyola players except Colleen Marshall, who was 9-19 (47.4%) from the field and made 4-7 (57.1%) three-point attempts on her way to scoring 24 points. The remainder of her teammates combined for 10-34 (29.4%) shooting from the field and just a 1-14 (7.1%) effort from three-point land in totaling 27 points.

"It seems when Marshall scores 20 points, they win and when she scores 10 points they lose," said Pemper. "Tonight she had 10 points in the first quarter.

"Beyond her performance, Loyola's size defensively and their maturity really showed tonight. Their players are experienced, know their roles and know what to do when they are on the court."

Uncharacteristically for the Mids this season, Navy turned the ball over 17 times while forcing only 13 turnovers. The Mids lead the lead in both turnovers forced and the fewest turnovers committed. Conversely, Navy held a slight 39-36 edge on the glass.

Taylor Dunham (So., Fort Belvoir, Va.) scored 11 points to lead the Mids in scoring, with Sarita Condie (Jr., Lovelock, Nev.) and Peyton Winters (Fr., Downers Grove, Ill.) each scoring six points. Additionally, Winters and Justice Swett (Jr., Nashville, Tenn.) both grabbed eight boards with Peri Curtis (Sr., Coronado, Calif.) snaring six caroms.

"Peyton was a real bright spot for us tonight," said Pemper.

Navy will next play Saturday at Lafayette.