ANNAPOLIS, Md. – Playing at home for the first time in 11 days, the Navy women's basketball team came out invigorated and hot from all areas of the Alumni Hall court on Wednesday night and posted its highest scoring first half against a DI opponent this season with 46 points. Unfortunately for the Mids (14-6, 6-3 PL) and their home fans, they ran into an equally explosive Lehigh Mountain Hawk (17-4, 8-1 PL) team that also posted 46 points in the first half. Even at the halftime intermission, the course of the game changed in the second half as Lehigh continued with its sharpshooting and pulled away from Navy for an 87-66 victory to strengthen its hold atop the Patriot League standings at the midway mark.

Zanai Barnett-Gay (So., Glenn Dale, Md.) paced the Mids with 19 points to go along with five rebounds and four steals. The reigning Patriot League Rookie of the Week, Julianna Almeida (Fr., North Arlington, N.J.) provided strong secondary scoring with a career-best 16 points on 6-12 shooting with a pair of three-pointers. Making her first collegiate start, Morgan Demos (Jr., Downers Grove, Ill.) had a well-rounded effort with six points, seven rebounds and two assists over 20 minutes of action.

"We had too many turnovers in the second half," remarked head coach Tim Taylor. "We kept trying to drive into something that wasn't there. They [Lehigh] are a tough matchup for us with their post players and overall length. We kept re-driving drives. We were stressing to our players to move the basketball, pass the basketball and share the basketball and we had nine assists in the first half. Then we only have three in the entire second half; we were over-driving and ended up with 12 turnovers. 

"We didn't shoot the ball well in the second half; we were just six of 30; you're not going to win many games shooting 20 percent. We also fouled too much; they went to the line 25 times and knocked down 21 of those opportunities. We've got to do a much better job with that. I'm disappointed in some of our individual efforts tonight."

Navy kicked off Wednesday's contest with a strong start that saw it jump out to a 10-4 lead over the first 2:59 of play. Almeida sparked this initial run with a three-pointer on the Mids' first possession before Barnett-Gay rattled off seven straight individual points. Down by six, the Mountain Hawks had a 6-0 retort over three possessions to pull even 10-10 by the 4:58 mark. The yo-yo action swung back in Navy's favor as three-pointers by Kyah Smith (So., Richmond, Va.) and Mary Gibbons (Fr., Holden, Mass.) helped the Mids go back up six, 18-12 just over two minutes later. Fifth-year sharp-shooter Maddie Albrecht flexed her experience with an unconscious 49-second span that saw her knock down three straight three-pointers to jolt Lehigh into the lead, 21-20 with 1:41 remaining in the first quarter. The teams posted nine combined points, five for Navy and four for Lehigh, over the final 100 seconds of action to leave the game knotted at 25-25. Both teams knocked down four three-pointers in the opening frame.

Just as the first quarter played out, the second stanza followed a similar script with offense early and often. The score advanced with ties at 27-27, 29-29 and 32-32. From that juncture at 6:29, the Mids scored nine of the next 11 points to take their largest lead of the game, 41-34. Demos bookended this run with a pair of layups, including a dynamic offensive rebound and putback at 4:02. As quickly as Navy bolted ahead, Lehigh had a rebuttal of its own with six unanswered points over the ensuing two minutes. With the score 41-40, a second three-pointer by Smith gave the Mids a brief four-point lead before Albrecht fired back with her fourth trey of the half to trigger a 6-0 run over a span of 44 seconds. A buzzer-beating jumper by Demos pulled Navy even as the teams retired to their respective locker rooms deadlocked at 46-46.

The highest scoring team in the Patriot League that came in averaging 70.88 points per game in its first eight conference contests and 69.5 over its first 20 overall games, Lehigh showcased its firepower with a 20-4 start to the third quarter. Trailing 66-50 with 1:41 left in the stanza, Navy had a loud answer of its own with points in four of its final five possessions to the tune of a 10-0 run. An 'and-one' conversion by Barnett-Gay ignited this run before Toni Papahronis (Jr., Edmond, Okla.) went two-for-two from the foul line followed quickly by three-pointer from Almeida and finally a long outlet pass from Saran Moschella (So., Staten Island, N.Y.) to a streaking Barnett-Gay for an easy layup before the buzzer.

Down just six, 66-60, the Mids hoped to extend that scoring momentum into final quarter of play and continue their comeback effort. The Mountain Hawks had a much different idea and nearly replicated their start to the previous quarter with a 21-2 run over the first 8:12 of play to go up 25, 87-62. Two points each from Moschella and Nia Henley (Fr., Spotsylvania, Va.) down the stretch helped Navy closed out the game with an 87-66 score.

In the second half, Lehigh out-scored Navy, 41-20 and shot almost 60 percent (14-24, 58.3%) from the field, while knocking down 10 of 11 free throws. Albrecht added 13 points in the half to conclude her day with a career-high 31 points.

For the game, Lehigh out-shot Navy, 51.8 percent (29-56) to 34.8 (23-66) from the field, 38.1 percent (8-21) from three-point range and 84.0 percent (21-25) to 68.4 (13-19) from the foul line.

The rebounding edge on Wednesday night went to the Mountain Hawks by two, 37-35, though the Mids had a substantial 15-8 advantage in offensive boards. Demos tied for the game-high with seven rebounds.

Defensively, Navy forced Lehigh into 15 turnovers and was credited with eight steals. Barnett-Gay was active with four steals.

"We've had a tough stretch," said Taylor in closing. "With our game at Bucknell on Saturday, we will have played five road games in 17 days. We're now down three post players. We're literally trying to remake a team with one day to prep in-between conference games. We're having to re-configure everything that we've been working on all season and even back through the offseason; Toni isn't a post player, but we had her out there tonight defending and playing the five. Instead of throwing the ball down on the block for a player like Kate [Samson] or Lizzie [Holder] we're having to create more and find gaps. We'll keep working on this. We're a talented team that will work hard to solve this new puzzle."

The Mids will kick off the second half of their league schedule with a road tilt at Bucknell on Saturday. The action in Lewisburg, Pa. is set for a 4 p.m. tip.