Box Score Maryville, TN - The Piedmont College women's basketball team could not complete a second half rally late against Maryville College today dropping a 74-64 decision to the hosting Scots in USA South action.  The Lady Lions trailed by just five points with 34 seconds left after a Taylor Swoszowski layup, but Maryville hit four consecutive free throws to ice the nine-point game at home handing PC the conference loss.

Maryville began on a 12-2 run to start the game and would lead throughout building a margin as high as 20 in the second half, but only held a single-digit advantage throughout much of the opening period.  With just over three minutes to go in the half, Lauren Hamel's jumper in the paint cut the Scots' lead to just two points at 24-22. 

However, Maryville scored the final five points of the half to take a seven-point lead into the locker room holding PC scoreless for the final 3:22 of the first half.  Points off turnovers separated the two as Maryville had tallied 11 point off takeaways compared to Piedmont's five in the same category though the Lady Lions were outscoring the hosting Scots in the paint 16-6, a category they finished up 36-22 for the game.

Piedmont's Hamel scored the opening bucket of the second half to trim the margin back down, but Maryville opened up a double digit lead going on a 17-6 run over the next three minutes plus exploding from beyond the three-point arc.  The Scots' Lauren Burnett put on a clinic from downtown hitting four three's in that opening run to help Maryville hold a 46-30 lead with 16 minutes remaining.

That lead ballooned to 20 points just four minutes later as Mackenzie Puckett got three the hard way to put the Scots up 59-39 with more than a dozen minutes remaining.  Despite the game looking to be out of reach for Coach Purdy's Lady Lions, the squad continued to battle trimming the advantage back to the single digits with a three of their own from Chandler Alverson off an assist from Swoszowski. 

Better known as "Swoz" to her Lady Lion teammates, the sophomore guard then scored four straight points for PC herself to cut that Maryville advantage down to seven points with 6:01 remaining putting the Scots faithful on the edge.  A three from Mary Kate Rushton pulled the visitors to within five with under three minutes to go, but the home team's Burnett answered right back with seventh and final three-pointer of the day the next possession down to put her team back up eight. 

Burnett was an unreal 7-for-8 from three-point land on the day as Maryville shot a video-game like 75% from downtown in the second half hitting on six of eight tries.  Maryville shot better than 52% from three-point distance for the game compared to just a 26.7% mark for PC who failed to connect a single three in the first half.

Swoszowski's layup with just over 30 seconds remaining once again trimmed the lead down to five, but four straight Maryville makes at the charity stripe proved the final margin of nine points in the 74-65 win as the Scots improved to 9-1 in league play holding a tight grip on the top spot in the conference's South Division. 

Two Lady Lions led the team in total points with Mary Kate Rushton and Carly Sales each scoring 13 points as the two combined to go 9-of-14 from the field.  Nine of Mary Kate's 13 came from downtown as she accounted for all but one of Piedmont's three-point tries on the day with Chandler Alverson getting the other.  Sales scored in double figures for the first time since getting a dozen in a January 18th contest at Methodist.

Lauren Hamel was the third of three Lady Lions in double figures in the scoring column with her ten which came on four of six shooting.  The team's leading rebounder was Symone Ball who pulled down six while Gabby Arencibia was next with five.  Freshman Brianna Barrett led the team in assists for the seventh time this season with her four helpers.

Piedmont falls to 6-3 in conference play with the nine-point road loss.  Overall the Lady Lions now are 12-6 having lost three of their last four games out after winning five straight games before that stretch.

The Lady Lions now must turn their attention to the Panthers of LaGrange College who come to Demorest four days from today for a February 5th evening game in the Cave.  Tip off time in the USA South showdown is set for 5:30 pm and features a battle for second in the South Division with Piedmont sitting in second at 6-3 while the Panthers are third at 6-4.