BALTIMORE – The Navy women's basketball team led for over 35 minutes on Saturday before a late comeback by Loyola spelled disappointment for the visitors as the Mids fell 70-67 at Reitz Arena. Leading 21-11 through one quarter and 55-48 mid-way through the fourth quarter, the Mids (6-13, 2-6 PL) fell victim to a frantic full court press by the Greyhounds (9-10, 4-4 PL) that resulted in four turnovers and just four made baskets over the final five minutes as their lead disappeared and sealed the come-from-behind win for Loyola.

The Mids had a quartet of players reach double-figures on Saturday led by Kyah Smith (Fr., Richmond, Va.), who paced all scorers with 19 points on 7-14 shooting from the field and three three-pointers, to go along with five assists over 39 minutes of action. Sydne Watts (Sr., Canton, Ga.) and Zanai Barnett-Gay (Fr., Glenn Dale, Md.) were right behind with 16-point and 15-point outputs, respectively. Barnett-Gay augmented her statline with game-highs of 11 rebounds and three steals. The fourth Navy player to reach double-digits was Kate Samson (So., Richmond, Va.), who tallied 12 points and three blocks in 22 minutes before leaving injured in the second half.

"This is a tough road loss as I thought we played well for the majority of the game," remarked head coach Tim Taylor. "What's disappointing about tonight is that we came in with the top turnover margin in the league. We've never really been sped up all year outside of the Penn State game and we had prepared for that. Unfortunately tonight, we had some players that ran away from the ball instead of coming to the ball and revert to bad habits, that I thought we had overcome, like throwing lob passes in those situations. We just have to be better. We turned the ball over seven times in the fourth quarter and that led to easy points for them; they had 13 points off turnovers in the fourth quarter alone. Whenever we got them into the half court, they didn't have as much success.

"We shot the ball a lot better today. I thought we also shared the basketball well in the first three quarters and were finishing plays. We missed some easy ones in the second half, but vice versa so did they in the first half. We've got to be able to make those kind of shots. We still scored 67 points; we actually scored more points in the second half than in the first, but it all comes back to the defensive side of the game. We just have to be better. We have to start holding teams to under 40 percent shooting. Whenever we do that, that is when we win games. Losing Kate hurt. She was pretty dominant when she was in the game. Once she left, they were able to get into the paint and find more high percentage looks."

Navy started out the game on fire as it burst out to a 10-0 lead over the first 2:58 of the contest. Watts was the early facilitator with five of those points, while Maren Louridas (So., Delmar, N.Y.) made the loudest basket as she splashed home a three-pointer in transition at 7:02. The teams traded three-pointers over the next minute of play as Barnett-Gay had an instant rebuttal to Loyola's Kelly Ratigan's trey. The Mids' advantage hovered around that 10-point mark for the next five minutes before taking its then-largest lead of the game, 19-8 on a Samson jump shot with 52 seconds left in the quarter. Following a three-pointer by the Greyhounds, two free throws by Samson on the Mids' final possession made it a 21-11 game through 10 minutes of action.

The second quarter started slowly as Loyola scored the only two points of the opening three minutes. Smith's first three-pointer of the game at 6:51 quickly helped Navy reach its 11-point advantage, 24-13. A small 4-0 run by the Greyhounds over the next three possessions was retorted by baskets from Watts and Smith to advance the score to 28-17 by the 4:35 mark. A slight 7-4 edge by Loyola to close the quarter wrapped up the scoring at 32-24 in favor of Navy. The Mids' offense in the first half flowed to the tune of eight assists over 11 made field goals, while going to the foul line seven times and making all seven free throws.

It didn't take long for Navy to go back ahead by double figures in the second half as Smith and Samson went back-to-back to make it 36-26 at 8:21. A 7-0 run by Loyola cut its deficit down to just three by the mid-way point of the third quarter. Three-pointers by Smith and Watts surrounded a Loyola field goal to quickly grow the Mids' lead back to seven points, 42-35 by the 4:08 juncture. That earlier run by the Greyhounds came back down the stretch as the hosts scored nine of the next 12 points. Leading just 45-44, Smith calmly knocked home her third three-pointer of the game for the final points of the stanza to give Navy a four-point advantage at the break.

Leading 48-44 through three quarters, the Mids built their edge out to seven, 55-48 over the first 4:39 of the final period of regulation. After that Barnett-Gay steal and score at 5:21, Loyola ran off 13 unanswered points as Navy was 0-2 from the field and turned the ball over three times as the Greyhounds turned up the defensive pressure. Trailing 61-55 with 2:47 remaining, the Mids were able to creep closer with three made field goals over their next four possessions to make it 65-62 with 42 seconds left. Barnett-Gay capped this stretch with a banked in three-pointer from the wing. Another three-pointer by Watts with 16 seconds left answered three successful Loyola free throws, though three points would be as close as Navy would get as the hosts held on for the 70-67 come-from-behind victory.

For the game, Loyola out-shot Navy, 45.0 percent (27-60) to 44.6 (25-56) from the field, though the Mids held advantages in three-point shooting, 47.4 percent (9-19) to 22.2 (4-18) and from the foul line, 88.9 percent (8-9) to 70.6 (12-17).

Navy out-rebounded Loyola by two on Saturday night, 34-32. Barnett-Gay led all players with 11 rebounds for her fourth double-double of the season. Louridas was the Mids' second-leading rebounder with eight boards.

Defensively, Navy forced Loyola into 10 turnovers and was credited with five steals. Barnett-Gay also paced all players with three steals. Samson turned aside three Greyhound shots with three blocks on Saturday. Over the past six games, the sophomore center has recorded multiple blocks five times.

"This will be a growing experience for us, but we're getting to a point in the season were we can't be having growing experiences at this time," said Taylor in closing. "We did execute some good plays at the end to get us back into the game, but overall we have to be better at handling that type of pressure. Our bench has got to be better moving forward, as well."

Navy will be back in action on Wednesday with a home tilt versus Lehigh. Tip-off between the Mids and Mountain Hawks is slated for 7 p.m. at Alumni Hall.