Concord Women Lose at WV State, 77-70 - Beckley, Bluefield & Lewisburg News, Weather, Sports

The Concord University women's basketball team dropped a 77-70 decision on the road at West Virginia State Thursday night in West Virginia Intercollegiate Athletic Conference action.

Three players scored in double figures for Concord (2-5, 1-2 WVIAC) with sophomore guard Leslie Mack leading the way with a team-high 17 points. Junior guard Logan Castlebury added 15 points while senior guard Tanisha Williams chipped in 12 points to go with a game-high 12 rebounds for her second double-double of the season. 10 of Williams'12 rebounds were offensive boards. She also passed out a team-best four assists.

In her first significant playing time of the season, freshman center Allison Mullins grabbed seven rebounds and blocked two shots in addition to scoring three points. Castlebury and sophomore forward Jacqueline Kestner each pulled in five rebounds as well.

As a team, Concord shot 70.6 percent from the free throw line (24-34), but just 33.3 percent (21-for-63) from the floor. West Virginia State (2-0, 2-0 WVIAC) hit 75.0 percent of its foul shots (15-for-20) and 45.2 percent of its field goal try's (28-for-62).

The Mountain Lions won the turnover battle, forcing 19 Yellow Jacket miscues to Concord's 16 while also holding advantages in points off of turnovers (24-21), second-chance points (18-12) fast break points (4-2) and bench points (37-19).

Concord played West Virginia State relatively even through the opening five minutes and trailed by just three points (12-9) at the 15-minute mark of the opening period, but the Yellow Jackets went on a 20-13 run over the next 10 minutes to extend their lead to 10 points at 32-22 with four minutes to play in the half. The Mountain Lions spent the rest of the game trying to make up the deficit, and nearly doing so on multiple occasions.

West Virginia State pushed its lead to as many as 13 points (48-35) in the second half before Concord made one of its patented comebacks to cut the Yellow Jackets' lead to just 54-53 with 11:05 to play in regulation thanks to a 18-6 spurt. The comeback was led by sophomore forward Rachel Artrip, who scored seven of her nine points on the night during the stretch.

The Mountain Lions eventually tied the game at 67-67 with 3:46 to play after a pair of free throws from Williams evened the score for the first time since it was 0-0. However, Concord's comeback bid was shot down by the Yellow Jackets in the final minutes as WV State managed to outscore CU 10-3 over the final minutes of play to hold onto the win.

Concord returns home for two non-conference contests starting with a Dec. 3 game against Virginia Intermont. Tip-off at the Carter Center is scheduled for 5:30 p.m.