by Casey Burinskas

ALTOONA, Pa. – La Roche University used a big third quarter scoring performance to deal the Penn State Altoona women's basketball team a 67-56 loss in the Adler Arena in Saturday's Allegheny Mountain Collegiate Conference Game of the Week.

Penn State Altoona (7-9, 4-3 AMCC) built a 27-26 advantage by halftime, but La Roche (12-4, 6-1 AMCC) outscored the Lions 27-16 in the third quarter to establish a double-digit lead by the period's end. The Redhawks maintained their lead through the fourth quarter, and Penn State Altoona suffered the conference loss.

Avana Sayles (Venetia, PA/Peters Township) scored a team-high 17 points for Penn State Altoona to go along with six rebounds, two assists, and two steals. Jess Burns (South Fayette, PA/South Fayette) added 15 points, and Raniyah Green (Hillside, NJ/East Orange/Hillside) recorded her second double-double of the season with 13 points and a game-high 10 rebounds while also blocking three shots.

La Roche got a game-high 19 points from Alexis Robison, while Dasja Anderson scored 17 for the Redhawks.

In the first quarter, Burns put the Lions on the board with a layup at 8:03. Green was then up with a jump shot, and she followed a few minutes later with a layup. With a foul against La Roche, Sayles secured two free throws to have Altoona trailing by only four with 1:26 left in the quarter. Jaidyn McCracken (Bellwood, PA/Bellwood-Antis) made a three-pointer for the Lions 29 seconds later, but the Redhawks ended the first quarter up 15-10.

Back into the second quarter, Sayles made a layup and free throw to start the scoring. Sayles later made another layup, followed by Burns' three-pointer that gave Altoona its first lead of the game by a score of 18-17. With the Redhawks coming back, the Lions responded with two jump shots from Sayles and a three-pointer from Madison Rusnica (DuBois, PA/DuBois) to give Altoona yet another lead of 25-22. With that, Rusnica generated more points for the Lions when she got a turnover from La Roche, went downcourt, and completed a layup to make it 27-22. With no more scoring for the home team, Altoona ended the half atop La Roche by a score of 27-26.

Early in the second half, La Roche was first to put up points, but it was not long before Altoona responded with a layup from Green and a three-pointer from Burns to put the Lions up by one, 32-31. Later, Green made a jump shot to keep the Lions up by one, 36-35, but La Roche went on a 7-0 run to create a 42-36 lead. Sayles' quick jumper ended the run, and Burns' three-pointer at 1:40 represented the final points for the Lions in the quarter to make it 47-43. But La Roche added six more points to its total, and the quarter ended with Altoona trailing 53-43.

Starting quarter number four, Sayles put up points with a jump shot for her team's first basket of the period. Trailing by 14 points further into the quarter, with only 5:45 remaining, Green was able to retrieve a rebound from Sayles and find the basket to bring Altoona's score to 49. With two late free throws from Sayles, the Lions got back to within nine points, 65-56, of the Redhawks' lead, but La Roche took over the rest of the way to hand Altoona another loss.

Next, Penn State Altoona women's basketball will be on the road again against AMCC opponent Pitt-Bradford at 7 p.m. on Wednesday, January 22.