Mountaineers Suffer 56-48 Loss to St. Bonaventure - WVU Football, WVU Basketball, News - Mountaineer Sports

The West Virginia women's basketball team suffered its first loss of the season as it fell 56-48 to St. Bonaventure, Friday at the WVU Coliseum.

The lead changed three times with the Mountaineers (1-1) only able to get up by three points in the opening half, while the Bonnies (3-0) stretched the lead to as many as 13 with 6:04 in the game.

WVU tied the game at 33-33 with 12:17 remaining, but St. Bonaventure went on a 10-2 run down to the 8:09 mark with eight points from leading 3-point shooter Jessica Jenkins, who sunk two threes in the run. The Mountaineers cut the deficit down to six points three times in the final three minutes, but ran out of time.

St. Bonaventure entered the game averaging 69.0 points per game and the Mountaineers held it below its scoring average with only 32.7 (16-49) percent shooting. However, WVU was only 28.1 percent (16-57) from the field and turned the ball over 16 times, which the Bonnies capitalized on with 21 points off turnovers.

"It is going to take awhile for the offense," coach Mike Carey said. "We will get better and it was good to see when we were down who was going to play hard and who wasn't. Some players on our team are not scoring and it kind of affects them defensively and we can't let that happen. When you are not scoring, you have to play better defense. I don't think we lost because of our defense; we lost because of our offense."

WVU converted only 52.2 percent (12-23) of its free throws, while St. Bonaventure made 90.5 percent (19-21) with Armelia Horton making a perfect 10-for-10.

"When you shoot 28 percent from the floor and 52 from the foul line, you are probably not going to win," Carey said. "There is a good chance you are not going to win. We fouled them at the end and put them at the line, without that, we probably would have held them in the 40's."

The Mountaineers were unable to contain St. Bonaventure's Jenkins as she scored her 1,000^th career point and led the game with 23 points, including all five of the Bonnies' threes. Horton and Megan Van Tatenhove also recorded numbers in double figures with 12 and 11 points, respectively.

Jess Harlee had a career night as recorded the first double-double of her career, putting up a career-best 12 points, pulling down a career-high 12 rebounds and recording three blocks and a steal. Fellow sophomore Brooke Hampton led the Mountaineers in scoring with 13 points, while Ayana Dunning pulled down 10 rebounds.

"Jess Harlee came in and played extremely hard," Carey said. "Jess Harlee is about 5'11 and had 12 rebounds, a charge, three blocks and a steal at the times she played. We have got to play people who are going to play hard."

WVU looks to bounce back, Sunday, as it plays host to North Carolina Central at 2 p.m. at the WVU Coliseum.