UNIVERSITY CENTER, Mich. - The Saginaw Valley State University women's basketball team dropped a hard fought battle against No. 1 Ashland University today (Dec. 8) by a final score of 81-67.

The Cardinals got on the scoreboard with an Alex Green (East Lansing, Mich. / East Lansing HS) layup at the 18:24 mark of the first half to cut the Eagles deficit to 7-2.

Ashland ran out to a large 29-14 lead after they had Saginaw Valley on their heels for the first 12 minutes of play.

The Lady Cardinals responded by stepping up their defensive aggressiveness and knocking down open jumpers to go on a 10-0 run in the final 4:10 of the first half. The surge was capped by a Kayla Womack (Grosse Pointe Woods, Mich. / Grosse Pointe North HS) layup to close the gap to 41-37 going into halftime.

The four-point halftime advantage was the smallest margin of the season for top-ranked Ashland against Division II opponents.

SVSU finished the first 20 minutes shooting 52.9 percent from the field as all nine Cardinals who played also scored in the first half. SVSU also dished out 10 assists in the half.

The Lady Cardinals continued to keep it close in the second half. Meijer 'Player of the Game' Emily Wendling (Flushing, Mich. / Flushing HS) scored two of her team-high 19 points on a jump shot to cut the lead to 69-61 with 8:46 left in the second half. Wendling would also grab a team-high 11 rebounds and a steal in the game.

Danielle Carriere (London, Ontario / John Paul II) scored a layup for SVSU with 7:02 left in the contest to close the gap to 69-65. However, the Cardinals could not get enough stops down the stretch and fell to the Eagles 81-67. 

SVSU used their bench to keep the game close as they had a 23-8 edge in bench points. Kayla Womack led the bench with eight points, while Briana Graham (Detroit, Mich. / Detroit Martin Luther King HS) chipped in with six. However, the Lady Cardinals managed only four points off turnovers, while surrendering 15 points to the Eagles. 

With the loss the Cardinals fall to 2-4 overall on the season and 1-2 in the GLIAC, while Ashland improves to 10-0 and 4-0 in the conference.  

The Cardinals will continue GLIAC play next Saturday (Dec. 15) when they travel to conference newcomer Malone for a 3:00 PM start.