Syracuse Pulls Away Late To Hand Pitt The Road Loss

Thursday, January 28

Syracuse, NY

6:00 PM

Pitt

4-5,2-4ACC

Syracuse University

8-3,5-3ACC

Pittsburgh

Syracuse

Syracuse Pulls Away Late To Hand Pitt The Road Loss

1/28/2021 8:40:00 PM | Women's Basketball

Box Score Syracuse Box Score Season Stats Highlights

SYRACUSE, NY – The Pitt women's basketball team (4-5, 2-4 ACC) fell on the road on Thursday night to the Syracuse Orange at the Carrier Dome by the score of 80-57. Pitt was within five with four minutes to play but the Orange pulled away down the stretch to take the home victory.

Dayshanette Harris led the Panthers in scoring in the loss as she netted 14 points and four Assists while going 7-for-11 from the floor. The sophomore also became the seventh fastest player in program history to net her 500^th career point, doing so on a jumper in the third quarter.

The Orange came out firing on Thursday as they raced out to an 8-0 lead just under two minutes in to force the Panthers to take a timeout. Out of the timeout, Cynthia Ezeja opened the scoring with a layup and Destiny Strother knocked down a triple to make the score 17-5 in favor of the Orange midway through the quarter. Pitt settled down late and started to hit shots as Amber Brown and Rita Igbokwe finished off layups before Emy Hayford closed out the scoring with a layup to send the game to the second quarter with Syracuse holding the 26-15 lead.

It was a sloppy start to the second quarter as Ezeja finished a layup and Igbokwe made a free throw to send the game to the media timeout in the second with Syracuse leading 31-18. After the Orange pushed their lead to 18, Tracey Hueston finished off a layup after a great feed from Harris and Harris diced through the Syracuse zone for a layup to send the game to half with the home team leading Pitt 41-26.

Harris opened up the third quarter with the first six points as she displayed a variety moves to score three straight jumpers against the zone and force a Syracuse timeout. After the Orange knocked down a triple, Hayford nailed a jumper to cut the Pitt deficit to 10, 44-34, at the media timeout. Strother knocked down her second three of the game and Gabbie Green netted a pair of free throws to send the game to the fourth with Pitt trailing 53-45.

Pitt opened up the final quarter with six straight as Brown netted two free throws and a jumper in the lane to make it 53-51 in favor of the Orange just over two minutes in. Syracuse pushed their lead back to nine but Pitt responded with four straight as Igbokwe finished off a layup and Everett netted a baseline jumper to make it 60-55 in favor of the home team. Out of the media timeout, the Orange took over the game and secured the 80-57 home victory.

On her birthday, Igbokwe had a strong game against a very big Syracuse front court as she netted nine points, eight boards and three blocks in 28 minutes of work. Brown finished off her night with nine points, eight rebounds and two steals while Strother came off the bench and provided nine points and a steal while connecting on three triples.

Syracuse was led offensively by Maeva Djaldi-Tabdi who netted 17 points in just 15 minutes while Emily Engstler had a double-double with 12 points and 13 rebounds in the win.
As a team, the Panthers shot just 32.8% from the floor while the Orange connected on 46.6% of their attempts. Pitt won the battle in the paint 30-24 but the Syracuse bench outscored the Panthers 37-19.

UP NEXT

Pitt will have a week off before returning to the court on Thursday, Feb. 4 as Virginia Tech invades the Petersen Events Center for a 7:00 pm tip on RSN (AT&T SportsNet Pittsburgh locally). The Panthers fell on the road to the Hokies earlier this year, 88-71.

PITT NOTES
Team

With the loss, Syracuse improves to 46-19 in the all-time series including a 25-7 mark in Syracuse. It also marked the Orange's 19^th straight win in the series.
Pitt was held to less than 40 rebounds for just the second time this season.
The Pitt offense was not able to shoot at least 40% from the floor for just the second time this season.

Dayshanette Harris

Harris finished off her night with a team-high 14 points and four rebounds across 32 minutes of action.
With her 10^th point on Thursday, Harris surpassed the 500 career point plateau. She is the seventh fastest to do so in program history, achieving the feat in just 39 career games.
She has now scored in double figures in eight of nine games this season and in 24 games across her career.

Rita Igbokwe

Igbokwe had another strong game for Pitt on Thursday as she netted nine points, eight rebounds and three blocks in 27 minutes of action.
The sophomore has scored at least nine points in three straight games for the first time in her Pitt career.
The eight boards were a team-high as she has now led the Panthers in rebounding 14 times in her career.
The three-block game was her third multi-block game of the season and 20^th of her career.
Over her last three games, Igbokwe is averaging 10.0 points, 7.0 rebounds and 3.3 blocks.