Women's Basketball Drops Tough Road Contest to Queens

CHARLOTTE, N.C. – The Mars Hill women's basketball team was denied its first conference win of the season, dropping a tough 67-56 contest at Queens on Saturday, December 17 inside the Levine Center. The Lions led the majority of the game but could not close the deal, falling to 2-9 overall and 0-5 in the conference, while the Royals improved to 3-8 overall and 3-3 within the league.

The opening half of the game was a back-and-forth, competitive affair that saw six ties and two lead changes. Mars Hill quickly raced out to a 9-3 advantage just over two minutes into the contest, but an 8-2 burst from Queens knotted the game for the first time at 11-all.

Madison Ervin knocked down a three at the 5:07 mark to ignite a mini 7-2 run by the Blue and Gold. However, every time Mars Hill made a run, the Royals turned the tables and battled back to keep the affair close. MHU held a slight 23-21 lead after one quarter of play.

Queens collected six of the first eight points of the second frame to claim its first lead of the contest at 27-25 with 7:27 remaining before the half. With the score at 30-27 in favor of the Royals, Sydney Comer hit back-to-back layups to fuel an 8-1 run over the next two minutes, reestablishing the lead for the Lions, 35-30. QU connected on a late field goal and Mars Hill headed to the locker room with a 35-32 margin.

Mars Hill opened the second half with eight consecutive points to open its first double-digit lead of the game (43-32), but Queens once again would not let the Lions run away with the game, scratching off an 8-0 run of its own to take the score back to the halftime deficit (43-40).  The Lions would eventually take that same point margin (47-44) into the final quarter.

The Royals tallied a 7-2 run to start the fourth, taking their first lead since the second quarter (51-49). Following a jumper from Comer, knotting the contest, Queens built its biggest lead of the game (50-41) with a huge 9-0 run over two and a half minutes leading into the final media timeout. That run ultimately became the deciding factor as Queens rallied to take the 67-56 win.

Comer led the Lions in scoring with a career-high 17 points on 8-of-12 shooting, while Ervin and Aliyah Farmer contributed 15 and 12 points, respectively. Farmer added a team-high eight boards. After a sizzling shooting performance in the first half (63.6%), Mars Hill cooled off and ended the game shooting 23-for-49 from the floor (46.9%). The Lions held a 28-23 advantage on the boards.

Mendy McNeese led the Royals with a game-high 24 points, including 6-of-11 from behind the arc. Queens shot 55.1% from the floor (27-49) in the winning effort.

The Lions will have a two-week hiatus in action before returning to the court on Saturday, December 31, playing host to Carson-Newman University. That game is scheduled to start at 2 p.m.