Jan. 31, 2007

Final Stats

Slippery Rock, Pa. - For the second time in the span of three nights, The Rock came oh-so-close to claiming a Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference-Western Division win Wednesday night.

The Rock dropped a 63-62 decision to visiting Clarion in Morrow Field House, 72 hours after it had lost a 61-59 decision Monday night at California U. of Pa.

With the losses, the Green and White saw its current losing skid reach three games, its overall record fall to 8-12 and its PSAC-West mark drop to 2-4.

Clarion improved its record to 7-13 overall, 2-4 in division play.

The Rock and Clarion, thus, finished the first half of the PSAC-West season tied with Lock Haven (9-11, 2-4) for fifth place.

Indiana U. of Pa. (15-6, 5-1) leads the division, followed by Shippensburg (14-7, 4-2). California (13-7, 3-3) and Edinboro (10-10, 3-3)are tied for third place, followed by SRU, Clarion and Lock Haven.

The Rock travels to Lock Haven for a 1 p.m. game Saturday before entertaining Edinboro at 6 p.m. next Wednesday, Feb. 7.

The top four teams in the division at the end of regular-season play will advance to the conference playoffs.

SRU seeks a second successive trip to PSAC postseason play and the fourth appearance in the conference tournament in Laurel Heilman's seven seasons as SRU's head coach.

Wednesday's game

Amanda Nero and Jessica Schake shared team-high scoring honors vs. Clarion with 12 points each. Schake also grabbed a team-best seven rebounds.

Nijha McNeely added 11 points, Nikki Presto seven points and six rebounds and Chere' Marshall seven points.

As the final score indicates, the teams battled tooth and nail throughout the game.

The largest lead of the night was a nine-point, 25-16, Clarion lead with 1:30 left in the first half.

The score was tied five times and there were five lead changes in the opening 20 minutes of action.

Clarion held a five-point (25-20) advantage at halftime.

SRU held the lead for a brief moment in the second half -- a layup by Nero gave the Green and White a 37-36 lead with 13 minutes left to play -- before Clarion put together a 10-2 run to take a seven-point lead (46-39) with 9:30 left.

The Rock came right back with an 8-1 run to tie the score at 47-47 with 6:45 left and trailed by one point on four separate occasions in the final 4:30.

Nero nailed a three-point shot just prior to the final buzzer to account for the final one-point margin.