Three Patriots registered double digits Thursday, but it wasn't enough as George Mason women's basketball fell to Dayton 84-73 at the Patriot Center. The Patriots fell to 11-11 on the season and 3-6 in conference play while the Flyers improved to 17-4 overall and 8-1 in the Atlantic 10.
“I thought our execution was much better for the most part, we didn't start either half very well, but we stayed the course and I thought overall we did some positive things,” head coach Nyla Milleson said. “It felt like Tay Brown was Tay Brown tonight and that's probably going to help this team more than anything.”
Taylor Brown had a game-high 28 points and narrowly missed a double-double with eight rebounds followed by Kristi Mokube with 17. Qierra Murray hit two threes in the last minute of play to finish the game with 10 points, just shy of her career-high. As a team, the Patriots shot 40.6 percent (26-64) from the field and outrebounded the Flyers 41-38. Senior Talisha Watts added four points in the effort, but added eight rebounds, two assists and two blocks.
“Talisha played the best game she's played in a while. I feel like we are at least headed back in the right direction,” Milleson said. “The major positive from Kristi and Talisha today was that we were looking to our posts and getting them the ball against a big team.”
After going into the half down 44-36, the Patriots scored just three points over the first nine minutes of the second half and found themselves down 69-48 with just over eight minutes remaining. The Patriots responded with a four-minute, 11-3 run and would outscore Dayton 25-15 over the final 12 minutes of action.
“I thought we showed a lot of character tonight,” Milleson said. “We've just been through a rough spot, but I thought we stayed strong and continued to play together and now we get to host Davidson Sunday for our Pink game which is always a very special game.”
The Patriots wrap up their homestand Sunday when they take on Davidson in the annual Play4Kay Breast Cancer Awareness game. Tipoff is set for 2 p.m. and fans are asked to wear Pink in support of the fight against breast cancer.
