WORCESTER, Mass. – The Navy women's basketball team found itself in a 40-minute battle with Holy Cross on Wednesday night in a Patriot League road contest. Close throughout the first three quarters, the Crusaders (13-7, 6-3 PL) were able to pull away late versus a game Midshipmen (7-13, 2-7 PL) squad and earn a 57-43 victory. A 10-0 run by Holy Cross late in the fourth quarter played a leading role in the eventual 14-point winning margin.
 
Mary Kate Ulasewicz (Sr., Doylestown, Pa.) was the high scorer for the Mids on Wednesday with 12 points; she added six rebounds in her 32 minutes of action. Montana Braxton (Sr., Cape Elizabeth, Maine) supplemented her classmate's line with eight points and five rebounds in 22 minutes off the bench.

"We competed really tough tonight," remarked head coach Stefanie Pemper. "We weren't shooting the ball great as a team, but with three and a half minutes to go we're down four points. We came out of that timeout preaching stop, score, stop and it's a one possession game. It just got away from us at the end; that's a credit to Holy Cross, they made some big shots and plays late. We talked about not having a letdown game after Army and I don't think we did. We can question if we had the legs because our shooting numbers weren't consistent with where I think our confidence and execution are at. I liked the looks that we got tonight. They [Holy Cross] mixed in some zone from time-to-time, but for the most part we got good shots.

"I'm happy with how Nyah Garrison and Montana Braxton shot it tonight. Nyah continues to grow. She made a couple of tough buckets and had a really smart play to take a charge to keep it really close. In Montana's case she hadn't played a ton the last couple of games she scored three times in the first half. Those two were able to finish well tonight." 

Ulasewicz got Navy on the scoreboard first as she took a Sophie Gatzounas (Jr., South Hadley, Mass.) pass for a jumper at 73 seconds into the game. The next time down the court, the Mids extended their early lead to 4-0 as Jasmine Bishop (Jr., Twinsburg, Ohio) made a layup as the shot clock was expiring. Navy's success out of the gate continued to the tune of 7-2 when Lindsay Llewellyn (Fr., North East, Md.) sank a three-pointer at 6:27. After a brief 4-0 run by the Crusaders got the hosts back into the game, the momentum swung right back for the Mids as they turned a one-point contest into an 11-6 margin by the 3:40 mark on the strength of baskets by Braxton and Ulasewicz. Neither team scored the rest of the period and the game moved onto the second quarter at 11-6.
 
Starting out the second quarter down five points, Holy Cross ended its six-plus minute scoreless streak with a Megan Swords layup at 9:18. An Oluchi Ezemma jumper 56 seconds later cut the host's deficit to one point at 11-10. Mired in its own six-plus minute drought, Braxton helped her squad go back up by three with a lengthy jumper off of a Bishop pass at 7:34. The Crusaders continued their strong play in the second quarter with an 10-2 run to take a 20-15 lead with 1:40 left in the stanza. Two free throw conversions by Nyah Garrison (Fr. Brookhaven, Pa.) with nine seconds left helped send the game into the locker room with a halftime score of 20-17.
 
Defense was the story of the first half as neither team broke the 30.0 percent threshold in field goal shooting as Holy Cross shot 28.6 percent (8-28), while Navy made 24.1 percent (7-29) of their attempts. The Mids forced nine Crusader turnovers on six steals.
 
Holy Cross extended its lead out to nine points in short order with six unanswered points over the opening 2:18 of the third quarter. With the score 28-18, Ulasewicz got Navy's deficit within single-digits again with a three-pointer from the top of the arc at 6:25. Offensive rebounds and putbacks by Garrison on consecutive possessions helped the Mids score their next four points and make it 32-25 by 4:02. Another lengthy jumper by Braxton 42 seconds later drew Navy even closer at 32-27. Two brief runs, one of the four-point variety for Holy Cross and one of the five-point variety for Navy closed the gap to just four, 36-32. Gatzounas put the exclamation point on the Mids' run with a three-pointer at 0:38. Holy Cross added a late free throw before the expiration of the period.
 
The back-and-forth action continued on in the fourth quarter as Holy Cross opened with a layup on its initial possession before Ulasewicz pulled up for a three-pointer at 9:12. A Gatzounas' free throw brought the game to a 39-36 margin before the Crusaders responded with three points only to see Morgan Taylor (Sr., Evans, Ga.) fire away and hit a three-pointer of her own at 7:26. Over the next two minutes both teams deposited one made field goal to continue the three-point contest. Holy Cross added one point to its lead as the clock headed towards three minutes to go in regulation. With the score 47-43, the Crusaders' Avery LaBarbera found success from three-point range on back-to-back possessions to spur Holy Cross ahead by 10. The hosts added four more points down the stretch to earn the 57-43 win
 
For the game, Holy Cross outshot Navy, 36.2 percent (21-58) to 29.1 (16-55) from the field and 25.0 percent (4-16) to 21.7 (5-23) from three-point range. The Mids held a slight 75.0 percent (6-8) to 68.8 (11-16) advantage in foul shooting.
 
In the battle on the glass, Holy Cross out-rebounded Navy by 13, 47-34. Taylor and Gatzounas led the Mids' effort on the boards with respective totals of eight and seven rebounds.
 
Defensively, Navy turned Holy Cross over 11 times with eight steals. Bishop and Ulasewicz each finished with two thefts.

"Saturday's game versus Loyola is really big," said Pemper. "We often times have really good games with Loyola. I feel that our team is maturing and improving our mental toughness. I think we're starting to develop a little more consistency with who is going to be able to defend hard for us, rebound tough for us and who's going to be able to make big some shots. We need to have that type of performance Saturday to get a win."
 
After flying home from Massachusetts, Navy will be back in action at home on Saturday when the Mids host the Loyola Greyhounds. The contest is set for a 4 p.m. tip-off at Alumni Hall in Annapolis.