Sacred Heart
Lehigh
SHU's Alisa Apo Nets 20 but Pioneers Fall, 63-53, at Lehigh
12/19/2007 12:00:00 AM | Women's Basketball
Dec. 19, 2007
BETHLEHEM, Pa. (December 19, 2007) - Sacred Heart freshman Alisa Apo (Freehold, NJ) scored a season-high 20 points but the Pioneers fell short of their third-straight win, losing on the road 63-53 at Lehigh Wednesday night. Lehigh senior Kaela Pearce scored all 17 of her points in the second half to lead the Mountain Hawks to win.
SHU (5-5) fought their way through a rough start, missing the eight shots of the night before a Stephanie Ryan (Coram, NY) lay-in ended the drought at the 14:15 mark. Ryan found some room in the lane on Sacred Heart's next possession for a lay-in and Kaitlin Sowinski (Hopkinton, RI) hit a turnaround baseline jumper on the next trip to erase the early Lehigh 6-0 lead and tying the game a minute later.
The Pioneers grabbed an 11-9 lead at the 11:45 mark but the Mountain Hawks used the three to jump back in front with a 14-4 run over the next six minutes. Lehigh got a pair of three's from Tricia Smith and another from Melissa Rich on the run to open their biggest lead of the half, 23-15, with 5:33 left.
Apo halted the Mountain Hawk rally with a pair of three's of her own followed by a triple from fellow freshman Maggie Cosgrove (Andover, MA) on the Pioneer's next three trips on offense to pull within 25-24. Erica Prosser and Claire Sullivan put Lehigh back up four but Sowinski finished the half with a three-point play to send SHU into the locker room down 28-27.
The Mountain Hawks (4-6) came out on fire to start the second half, ripping off a 14-2 run over the first eight minutes to pull in front, 42-29. Sowinski put an end to the rally with a bucket at 11:47, stopping a one-for-10 shooting drought, including nine-straight misses.
The Pioneers were able to chop the lead down to six, 44-38, at the eight minute mark thanks to Apo's third three of the night but Lehigh had an answer, quickly bouncing the lead back to 10. Pearce did much of her damage over the final five minutes, scoring 10 of her 17 as the Mountain Hawks kept SHU at bay the rest of the way for the win.
SHU shot just 33.3% (18-54) from the field in the loss and were outrebounded 41-30. In addition to Apo's 20, Sowinski and Ryan both found double digits. Sowinski finished with 14 points and three blocks while Ryan had 13 with eight boards.
Lehigh also got 17 points from Rich and 11 apiece from both Prosser and Smith. The Mountain Hawks shot 52.2% (12-23) in the second half and scored 22 points off 20 SHU turnovers.
The Pioneers will return home to play host to the Princeton Tigers this Saturday, December 22nd at 2:00 pm. The women's game will take place following the SHU men versus Harvard.
