ANNAPOLIS, Md. – In a rematch from last year's Patriot League Tournament, the Navy women's basketball team was unable to gather a bit of revenge on the Holy Cross Crusaders as the visitors from Worcester, Massachusetts used a 58.3 percent shooting performance from the field and a 6-of-8 mark from the foul line in the fourth quarter to pull away from the Mids. Extremely competitive throughout the contest at Alumni Hall on Saturday afternoon, the Mids (7-6, 1-1 PL) led for 17:59 minutes of action and as late as the three-minute juncture of the third quarter before the Crusaders (8-5, 2-0 PL) closed the game with a 19-8 run over the final eight minutes of regulation play to secure the 66-55 victory.

The Mids had a trio of players reach double figures on Saturday led by Zanai Barnett-Gay (Jr., Glenn Dale, Md.) and Julianna Almeida (So., North Arlington, N.J.), who tied for the team lead with 15 points each. Mary Gibbons (So., Holden, Mass.) provided Navy with 12 points off the bench on 4-of-7 shooting from three-point range.

"We weren't physical enough on defense today," remarked head coach Tim Taylor. "We turned the ball over too much and in tough situations. They [Holy Cross] literally had the same game plan that we did for them; we were isolating their ball screens and so were they. We just didn't handle them well enough. I thought Kaitlyn Flanagan had a great game; she only had seven points, but she controlled the game. Kendall Eddy hit some big shots for them. We were 6-of-30 from three, its hard to win many games shooting that poorly. Plus, we only got seven offensive rebounds. That's today in a nutshell.

"We didn't get any offensive rebounds and when we needed to get a stop it didn't seem like we could get one. We took a couple ill-advised shots today. We didn't capitalize on the opportunities that they gave us. You need to do that against really good teams like Holy Cross. They are a seasoned, veteran team. They've won a lot of games. I'm disappointed in our effort today. We didn't have great energy from the start and I don't know why. That's going to fall on me to figure that piece out."

The action opened evenly as the teams traded baskets for the first five minutes before Navy took the game's first two-possession lead at 4:02 when Almeida hit the Mids' first three-pointer of the contest. Another three-pointer, this one courtesy of Gibbons at 3:04 extended the host's lead to seven, 14-7. After an exchange of field goals the score advanced to 16-9 with 2:37 remaining in the first quarter. Holy Cross pulled closer down the stretch and made it a 20-16 game through 10 minutes of play.

As a team, Navy shot 53.3 percent (8-15) from the field and forced Holy Cross to turn the ball over four times in the first quarter.

The slight momentum that the Crusaders grabbed in the closing minutes of the first continued on into the second quarter when they knotted the game at 20-20 within the first 1:44 of the period. Consecutive three-pointers by Gibbons helped jolt the Mids back in from by four, 26-22 by the 5:28 mark of the quarter. The ebbs and flow of the stanza continued in the second five-minute portion as Holy Cross re-tied the game at 1:24 following a Meg Cahalan free throw. A three-pointer by the Crusaders' Kendall Eddy rounded out the squad's 7-0 run to close the quarter as the visitors took a 33-30 lead into the locker room at halftime. 

The tight back-and-forth action carried over into the second half as Holy Cross went up five, 37-32 at 9:21 before Navy fired back with a Maren Louridas (Sr., Delmar, N.Y.) three-pointer and Barnett-Gay driving layup on back-to-back possessions to draw even by the 8:07 mark, 37-37. The offenses for both teams struggled over the majority of the rest of the period as Holy Cross made just three baskets versus two for Navy, a Morgan Demos (Sr., Downers Grove, Ill.) jump shot and a Gibbons three-pointer. With points hard to come by, the game advance to the quarter break with the Crusaders barely ahead, 45-44.

The matchup between two of the favorites to win the Patriot League continued to entertain the spectators at Alumni Hall with the sixth tie of the game coming off a Barnett-Gay free throw at 8:00. With the score knotted at 47-47, a quick series of plays by the Crusaders' Kaitlyn Flanagan and Kendall Eddy proved to make the difference in winning and losing as Flanagan drove through the lane for the go-ahead basket before Eddy immediately picked off the in-bounds pass and nailed a three-pointer to swing Holy Cross into the lead by five with 7:29 left in regulation. Navy never was able to muster a strong enough response to get closer than five for the remainder of the game as the Crusaders out-scored the Mids, 14-8 over the final six-plus minutes.

Holy Cross sealed the 66-55 victory with a 21-11 scoring advantage in the fourth quarter on 7-of-12 shooting from the field and a 6-of-8 effort from the foul line, while Navy was only able to hit three of its 14 attempts and missed all seven of its three-point tries.

For the game Holy Cross out-shot Navy from the field, 42.4 percent (25-59) to 31.7 (20-63) and from three-point range, 31.6 percent (6-19) to 20.0 (6-30). The Mids were a crisp 9-11 from the foul line for an 81.8 percent showing versus a 52.6 (10-19) effort for the Crusaders.

Holy Cross held a significant advantage in rebounding, 48-34 with an 11-7 edge in offensive boards and a 37-27 margin in defensive caroms. Barnett-Gay led Navy with eight rebounds with Almeida one back at seven.

Defensively, the Mids forced the Crusaders into 17 turnovers and were credited with nine steals. Barnett-Gay was at the forefront of that category, as well with three thefts. In limited action before leaving injured, Kate Samson (Sr., Richmond, Va.) blocked a pair of Holy Cross shots; her third straight game with two blocks.

"We have to work on our preparation for game day," concluded Taylor. "I felt that we had two days of well-executed practice leading up to this game, but we didn't have that transfer over to today. We had some good looking shots, that didn't go down, but so did they, that's basketball. Losing Kate Samson, that was a killer. She's a big key to what we're doing. Her and Quinn [Boettinger] both have important roles for us and we didn't have either of them in the second half. Hopefully that's a short-term thing and we won't be missing her for long. Not having her rim presence, hurt us this afternoon. We've got to learn to play together a little bit better. We're still a young team and we're trying to incorporate our freshmen into the action."

Navy will be back in action on the road with a bout at Bucknell on Wednesday night at 6 p.m. The contest will be the first of two straight away from Alumni Hall as the Mids will play a second game in Pennsylvania with a matchup versus the Lafayette Leopards on Saturday afternoon.