Box Score

WICHITA, KS—An ice-cold shooting performance to open the second half proved fatal for the Winthrop women as they fell 69-57 to George Mason in the first game of the WSU Winter Classic at Wichita State.

The Eagles, who trailed the entire game, were down 31-25 at halftime, but missed their first 11 shots attempts to open the second half and fell behind by a dozen points at 39-27 when Aliyah Kilpatrick finally scored on a layup with 14:10 remaining in the game. Winthrop made just one of its first 15 second half shots and fell behind by as many as 15 points on three occasions in the final six minutes.

Winthrop falls to 5-4 while George Mason improves to 7-3.  The Eagles will face the host Wichita State Shockers at 4:00 p.m. on Saturday while GMU will play Louisiana-Monroe.

"I'm extremely disappointed about our performance.  We got beat in every phase of the game," said Winthrop head coach Kevin Cook. "We played with no life and no energy. Now we've got to regroup quickly, but it won't be about Wichita State tomorrow.  It's about us.  We got beat on the boards and couldn't get anything going offensively." 

Winthrop shot 33 percent for the game on 20 of 60 field goals compared to 39 percent for GMU (27-69).  The Patriots also won the rebound battle 48-38.

Winthrop did get a season-high scoring performance by senior guard Samiya Wright who led the Eagles with 17 points.  Erica Williams, who struggled with her shooting, did record her third double-double of the season with 10 points and 10 rebounds, but she went 4 of 14 from the floor. Cook said he was concerned that she might have a little rust on her shot after missing the last game against Davidson with a sprained ankle.  Schaquilla Nunn finished with 14 points and nine rebounds. Kilpatrick, who was coming off a career-high scoring performance, finished with six points as she, too, struggled with her shooting and finished 2 of 12 from the floor.

GMU guard Taylor Brown led all scorers in the game with 26 points as she connected on 4 of 8 three-pointers.  Kristi Mokube had a double-double with 14 points and 10 rebounds while Jasmine Jackson finished with 15 points.

The Eagles were able to cut the deficit to nine points with 8:20 left after Wright scored back-to-back buckets on an reverse layup and a 3-pointer to cap a 7-2 run and make it a 47-38 game.  GMU went back up by 15 following three straight 3-pointers by Brown to give the Patriots an insurmountable 64-49 lead with 2:21 remaining.  To the Eagles credit, they fought back to get to within eight points at 65-57 on a putback of her own miss by Nunn with 38 seconds left.

George Mason took advantage of 15 Eagle turnovers to enjoy a 24-7 advantage in points off turnovers and the Patriots also dominated the paint by outscoring Winthrop 36-20.

The Eagles fell behind by seven at 9-2 after the opening 4:25 of the game and trailed by as many as 12 points twice in the first half before cutting the deficit to six at 31-25 on a 3-pointer by Pamela Decheva with 45 seconds left before intermission.  Brown scored 11 of George Mason's first half total.