Jan. 15, 2010

Box Score

ST. LOUIS - The Rhode Island women's basketball team fell to Saint Louis, 64-50, on Friday night at Chaifetz Arena. The loss evens Rhody's record at 9-9 (2-1 Atlantic 10) while the Billikens improve to 7-11 (1-2).

Freshman Ashley Rivera finished with a game-high 17 points while senior Lindsay Harris recorded 14 points and 10 rebounds for her sixth double-double of the season.

As a team, the Rams shot 38.6% (22-57) while holding the Billikens to a 35.0% performance from the field. SLU, however, won the battle of the boards (43-39).

Rhode Island opened up an early 5-2 lead after Rivera netted a three and went on to set up senior Andrea Buck's first basket of the night with 18:51 on the clock. However, a layup by Amanda Kemezys capped a 15-0 Saint Louis push that put the Billikens on top 17-5 with 13:40 remaining.

The Rams came back with a 10-2 run to cut their deficit to four (19-15) with 6:19 left in the half but Saint Louis went on to force four more Rhody turnovers while building up a nine-point lead (30-21) to take into the locker room.

At the break, SLU's Kemezys and Katie Paganelli led all scorers with eight points apiece.

The Billikens maintained a double-digit advantage through most of the second half - taking their largest lead of the game (14 points) after a pair of free throws by Lauren Woods made the score 48-34 with 10:35 remaining. URI was able to get within seven twice more - once on a layup by sophomore Lara Gaspar (48-41) and again on a jumper by Harris (53-46) - but could not get any closer as the Billikens outscored the Rams, 11-4, the rest of the way to pick up their first conference victory of the season.

Kemezys led the way for Saint Louis with 16 points and 13 boards. Lauren Woods and Janisha Geralds also scored in double figures for the Billikens, netting 14 and 10 points, respectively.

Rhode Island is back action on Tuesday night when it returns to the Ryan Center to take on Temple at 7 p.m. The game will be televised, locally, on Cox Sports.