Women's Basketball Stumbles in Season Opener

(Lansing, MI)-- The Cleary Cougar women's basketball team started off slow in their season and home opener Friday afternoon, and the visiting Mount Vernon Nazarene Cougars took advantage, building an early lead, and never looking back en route to an 86-69 loss for Cleary.

The visiting Cougars of MVNU started the game on a 13-2 run in the first four minutes of play, before Taedom Stein broke the scoreless drought.  MVNU would expand their lead to 19-2 in the first quarter, and then Cleary would start to wake up and began cutting into the MVNU lead.  The two teams would both pick up the tempo, and MVNU would lead 33-16 after the first quarter.  The second quarter was a much lower scoring affair, and Cleary was able to cut the lead to 12, before MVNU went on a run to finish the half, with MVNU leading 43-26 at the break.

After a couple quick MVNU baskets, Cleary would go on a run of their own, to get the deficit to single-digits.  Samantha Hoelscher helped lead the charge, scoring 8 points in the third quarter alone, but some key offensive rebounds for MVNU helped them regain the double-digit lead into the fourth quarter.  Still trailing in the fourth quarter, a Rylee Thomas fast break layup cut the deficit to 9 points, but that would be as close as Cleary was able to get, and ultimately fell 86-69.

Taedom Stein led Cleary with 19 points, 9 rebounds, and 6 assists, all team highs.  Samantha Hoelscher added 13 points and 4 rebounds off the bench in her first action as a Cougar, while Amy Jackson and Amelia Storm each had 10 points for Cleary.

Cleary is 0-1 to begin the season, and will be back at Gannon Gymnasium on Saturday, October 26, to take on the Saint Francis Fighting Saints in a non-conference matchup in Cleary's Breast Cancer Awareness game.  The game is set to begin at 1:00 PM ET, and all fans attending are encouraged to wear pink.