December 30, 2006

BOX SCORE

RICHMOND, Va.- The Longwood women’s basketball team dropped a 69-43 decision to VCU Saturday evening at the Alltell Pavilion in Richmond. Longwood falls to 5-11 on the season while VCU improves to 7-4 on the year. The Lancers will return to action on Friday, January 5, when they to travel to Lynchburg to take on Big South member Liberty. Tip-off between the Flames and Lancers will be at 7 p.m..

After VCU took an early 5-2 lead Ashleigh Hollman/Centreville (Westfield) hit a three pointer to tie the game at five with 17:25 remaining in the half. Led by Krystal Vaughn the Rams offense poured on the pressure in the final ten minutes, out rebounding Longwood 30-11 in the opening half, 12 of which came from Vaughn. Keiva Small/Norfolk (Norview) closed the first half strong, recording the Lancers’ final six points as Longwood headed to the locker room down by 15 at the break.

Small started the second half like she ended the first, collecting six of the Lancers’ first seven points after the break. The Rams came out strong building a 23 point lead through the first five minutes of the half. Longwood was able to cut the deficit to 18 with 11:30 to go after Anna Steg/Fairfax (George C. Marshall) hit a lay-up to put the score at 48-30. That’s as close as Longwood got as VCU’s Quanitra Hollingsworth led the way in the final ten minutes of the game to give the Rams their first win in five games.

Leading the way for Longwood was Small who recorded a season high 16 points in the loss and was one rebound shy of a double-double. For the game Longwood shot 32.7% (18-55) from the field and pulled down 33 rebounds in the loss.

“I was happy with our overall effort,” stated head coach Pamela Bass. “VCU came out and was stronger and quicker than us but we hung in there and just played our game. We saw great things come from our transition in the game and you are beginning to see the players get comfortable in our system.”