Carlene Hightower scored 20 points - her fourth straight with at least 20 and added nine boards.

Melanie Gibbons set a career-high with 12 rebounds.

Jamie Walsh added 11 points in the Explorers' loss.

PHILADELPHIA, PA - The La Salle University Women's Basketball team dropped its first Atlantic 10 Conference and Big 5 game of the season with a 71-60 loss to Saint Joseph's Friday afternoon at Alumni Memorial Fieldhouse, despite a combined 40 points from senior Crista Ricketts (Douglasville, PA/Daniel Boone) and junior Carlene Hightower (Philadelphia, PA/Archbishop Prendergast).

 

The pair each scored 20 points, the eighth time this season for both of them, while Ricketts added 12 boards for her sixth double-double of the season. Hightower, who has now scored 20 or more points in four straight games, added nine rebounds and three assists to her totals.

 

The top scorers on each team - Saint Joseph's Ayahna Cornish and Hightower - did not disappoint the 1,200 fans in attendance for the school's annual "Fieldtrip to the Fieldhouse", as they combined for 17 of the game's first 19 points. Cornish finished with a game-high 24 points.

 

The Hawks led for most of the first half, but when Ricketts got her first basket of the game off an assist from freshman Morgan Robertson (Amarillo, TX/Amarillo) with 7:59 left in the first, La Salle took its only lead of the game at 19-18.

 

Saint Joseph's (8-7, 1-1 A-10, 2-0 Big 5) responded with a 12-4 run over the next 5:30, including six straight capped by back-to-back baskets by Cornish to take a seven-point lead at 30-23 with 2:32 left before intermission.

 

However, the Explorers held the Hawks scoreless from that point until halftime and scored the last four points, three by Ricketts to trail by three at the break. They cut it to a point after Ricketts opened the second half with a basket.

 

The Hawks would use a 9-1 run over the next four minutes to build their largest lead of the game to that point at nine - 41-32 with 14:12 left in the game, before the Explorers responded with a 8-2 run of their own.

 

Ricketts scored six straight points in the span to make it a 41-38 game, and after a Hawk basket, Hightower converted a pair of free throws with 12:15 remaining.  After a defensive stop, Ricketts had a short jumper that rolled just off the rim - the basket would have cut the deficit to one.

 

It did not and on Saint Joseph next possession Jenna Loschiavo hit a three to push the Hawk lead back to six and then a 5-0 run after a Hightower basket, capped by another Loschiavo three made it a nine-point game and the Explorers would never get closer than six the rest of the way.

 

The Explorers out-rebounded the Hawks 43-30 - thanks in part to a career-high 12 rebounds by junior Melanie Gibbons (Bridgewater, NJ/Bridgewater-Raritan), but the Hawks hit 11 three pointers in the game. 

 

La Salle (13-4, 1-1 A-10, 2-1 Big 5), who had hit 11 threes in each of its previous two contests, had just two before freshman Jamie Walsh (Downingtown, PA/Downingtown East), who scored 11 in the game, hit two in the game's final minute.

 

They were trying to go 3-0 in the Big 5 for the first time since the 1997-98 season, which was the last time they also won a game at Saint Joseph's - they are now 0-5.

 

The Explorers return to action when they host Rhode Island at Tom Gola Arena, Sunday at 1 PM.