NEW ROCHELLE, N.Y. – The Navy women's basketball team withstood punch-after-punch by Iona in front of a boisterous Kids' Day crowd at the Hynes Athletic Center on Tuesday. Tipping off at 11 a.m. before a called crowd of 2,171 spectators, most of whom were school-aged children, the Mids (3-0) overcame a slow start with a suffocating brand of defense over the final three quarters that held the Gaels (0-2) to just 34 points and 24.1 percent (13-54) shooting. After 40 minutes of nail-biting competition, Navy walked away with a 55-53 victory over Iona.

Zanai Barnett-Gay (So., Glenn Dale, Md.) filled up the box score on Tuesday with her first double-double of 2024-25 courtesy of a team-high 14 points and 10 rebounds. Additionally, the All-Patriot League Defensive Team member, grabbed three steals and blocked a pair of shots, while dishing out four assists in 37 minutes of action. Maren Louridas (Jr., Delmar, N.Y.) did a little bit of everything for the Mids as she recorded nine points, six rebounds and two steals. Toni Papahronis (Jr., Edmond, Okla.) sparked Navy's comeback with hard-nosed defending that resulted in a career-high four blocked shots and a team-high +10 in the +/- statistic.

"It's always hard to win on the road, especially when you have an 11 a.m. game in front of a packed house that made for a big home-court advantage," remarked head coach Tim Taylor. "It's a great win because we fought through some adversity. They [Iona] came out and punched us in the mouth, going up nine early. Then we stretched it out to eight in the fourth quarter and we missed seven straight layups. We have to be better finishing at the rim. We didn't box out well today at all; we gave up 20 offensive rebounds, that's not good. We'll definitely have to improve in that part of our game. We also had some really bad turnovers at inopportune times and Iona was able to take advantage of them. We'll have to limit those live ball turnovers too.

"I give Iona a lot of credit, they came out and were prepared for our traps early; they were able to get some open threes out of those. They were carving us up so we changed our lineup and went with a more defensive group in the second quarter. We also made a strategic adjustment and started switching everything; that change took some of their shots away. We competed and played really hard defensively."

Trailing 8-3 early, the Mids responded with seven unanswered points capped by a Lizzie Holder (So., Stillwater, Minn.) 'and-one' at 4:12 to allow Navy to re-take the lead 10-8. The Gaels fired back from this challenge with a 11-0 run of their own to pull ahead 19-10 by the 1:45 mark. A crisp pass out of the post by Holder to Mary Gibbons (Fr., Holden, Mass.) on the wing for an open three-pointer put an end to the run on the ensuing possession.

After Iona shot 53.3 percent (8-15) from the field and 3-5 from three-point range to build up a 19-13 lead through one quarter of play, Navy changed up its defensive looks and ratcheted up its pressure in the second period. Those changes started making an impact almost immediately as the Mids scored the first seven points of the stanza to jump back in front 20-19 at 7:23. Barnett-Gay got the offense going during a stretch of three straight makes as she broke out for a layup following a Kyah Smith (So., Richmond, Va.) steal and assist before Gibbons knocked down her second three-pointer of the game and Barnett-Gay repaid Smith with a steal and breakout pass of her own. Over the final seven minutes of the quarter, the score was tied at 20-20, 22-22, 24-24 and lastly 26-26. Julianna Almeida (Fr., North Arlington, N.J.) netted Navy's 22nd and 24th points, respectively before Morgan Demos (Jr., Downers Grove, Ill.) tied the game going into the halftime intermission with a successful post-up with less than five seconds to go.

A 5-0 individual start to the second half by Louridas gave the Mids their first multi-possession lead of the game. Trailing 31-26, the Gaels had a quick rebuttal with nine unanswered points over the next 3:14. Back-to-back baskets by Navy surrounding the under-five media timeout pulled the visitors back square, 35-35 at 4:31. Louridas' sixth and seventh points of the quarter extended Navy's run to 6-0 and pushed the Mids back into the lead. As the score slowly crept to 40-39 in favor of Navy at 1:39, the Mids closed out the period with the final four points to hold a 44-39 edge through 30 minutes of play.

The constant ebbs-and-flows of the contest continued into the fourth quarter where Iona's Judith Gomez banged home a three-pointer on the Gaels' first possession before the Mids fired back with six unanswered points to establish their largest lead of the game of eight, 50-42. From that point at 7:40, Navy's offense went silent for nearly six minutes as Iona was able to methodically shave six points off its deficit. A pair of free throws by Louridas at 1:49 and a fast break layup by Holder at 1:08 helped the Mids extend its lead to six, 54-48. Aided by its passionate fan base, the Gaels went down swinging and fought right back with four straight points to make it a two-point game with 27 seconds remaining. The teams split free throw opportunities over their final possessions, though an intentional miss by Iona's Ella Fajardo added to the intensity as a loose ball with one second remaining ended up in the hands of Zoey Ward, who immediately threw an unsuccessful off-balanced shot towards the hoop as time expired.

For the game, Navy out-shot Iona, 38.2 percent (21-55) to 30.4 (21-69) from the floor, 50.0 percent (4-8) to 21.4 (6-28) from three-point range and 64.3 percent (9-14) to 62.5 (5-8) from the foul line.

In the battle of the boards, the home Gaels grabbed four more rebounds, 43-39 with a significant 20-12 edge in offensive rebounds. Barnett-Gay led the Mids with a season-high 10 caroms.

Defensively, Navy forced Iona into 15 turnovers and was credited with nine steals. Barnett-Gay also paced the Mids in that statistical category with three. Navy was active with its post defense as well with eight blocks. Papahronis led the Mids with a career-best four rejections.

"This game and this win will help us down the road," said Taylor in closing. "We got to experience an intense environment; it was so loud. Personally, I thought it was really fun and great for the game of women's basketball to have that type of crowd. We made some plays down the stretch to hold on for the win. We'll definitely work on boxing out better and taking care of the ball better, but if we compete and are tough and physical, we were able overcome some of those mistakes today. A win's a win. It's hard to win, but the more you win, the harder it is to lose."

Navy will have a quick turnaround as it'll be back on the hardcourt in just over 48 hours for another non-conference contest as the Mids will host the Wagner Seahawks at Alumni Hall on Thursday evening at 7 p.m.