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Junior guard Shanice Fuller

Georgetown held off a late second-half run by the West Virginia Mountaineers and ran away in overtime for a 79-73 victory Wednesday night, the Hoyas’ third win in a row. In a very tightly officiated game, Georgetown (16-10, 6-7 Big East) showed more depth than West Virginia (14-11, 3-9), who dressed only eight players and saw three starters foul out in overtime.

“They’re not playing with many players,” Head Coach Terri Williams-Flournoy said. “We play everybody, so I think at the end we did kind of wear them down. But they still fought hard. They kept fighting; they never gave up.”

A layup from freshman forward Latia Magee with 8:54 remaining put Georgetown ahead 60-52, but the Hoyas missed their next seven attempts and fell behind 63-62. Junior guard Shanice Fuller banked in a layup with 38 seconds remaining to end the shooting slump and regain the lead.

West Virginia’s sophomore guard Liz Repella hit two free throws for a 65-64 lead with 29 seconds left. Fuller then got into the lane and got fouled, heading to the line with 15 seconds to go. Fuller missed the first but made the second to tie the game at 65. West Virginia squandered a couple of chances in the final seconds and the game went into overtime.

“We gave up the lead, but basketball’s a game of runs, that’s just how it goes,” senior guard Karee Houlette said. “We went on a run, they went on a run; fortunately, we came back to tie it up to take them into overtime.”

Junior forward Jaleesa Butler scored the first five points in overtime, and Houlette’s three-pointer with 1:48 gave the Hoyas a 73-65 lead, effectively burying the Mountaineers. West Virginia was forced to send Georgetown to the line, resulting in three Mountaineer starters picking up their fifth fouls. The Hoyas easily held on for the victory.

The trio of Houlette, Fuller and Butler gave the Hoyas a balanced offensive attack all evening. Houlette scored a team-high 22 points, with Fuller providing 19 points and Butler adding 13 points and nine rebounds. Freshman guard Adria Crawford contributed eight points before fouling out with just over four minutes left in regulation.

The Mountaineers’ senior guard Takisha Granberry’s remarkable outing single-handedly kept West Virginia in the game. The senior guard scored a career-high 31 points while shooting 10-for-20 from the floor and 6-of-13 from behind the arc. Repella did add 19 points, but she shot an erratic 6-of-19 from the field. West Virginia’s third leading scorer, sophomore guard Sarah Miles, scored seven points on just 2-of-12 shooting.

The Hoyas jumped out to a 7-0 lead in the game’s first three minutes with baskets from sophomore guard Monica McNutt and Butler and a three-pointer by Houlette. West Virginia bounced right back with a 15-2 run of its own, which included Gransberry’s first two treys of the game, giving the Mountaineers a 15-9 advantage.

Georgetown repeatedly threw the ball away on ill-advised passes during that stretch and West Virginia forced several other turnovers by jumping in the passing lanes and picking the pockets of Georgetown’s backcourt. The Hoyas had 15 first-half turnovers, which the Mountaineers converted into 19 points.

A Houlette three broke a scoreless stretch of nearly four minutes for Georgetown. Houlette drained another triple on the Hoyas’ next possession and a pull-up jumper by freshman guard Rubylee Wright leveled the game at 17-17. The remainder of the first half was a back-and-forth affair, with neither team leading by more than four points. A long three-pointer from Wright gave the Hoyas a 28-26 lead with just under six minutes left, but Granberry’s 17 first-half points gave the Mountaineers a 35-34 edge at the break.

Houlette opened the second half scoring with a jump shot followed by a steal and a fast-break layup, the start of a 10-2 run that gave the Hoyas a 44-37 advantage. Georgetown started the half on fire offensively, hitting eight of its first 11 shots. The Hoyas were able to extend their lead to nine at 54-45, their largest of the game. Georgetown made its next three field goals to maintain the lead, but after Magee’s layup gave the Blue and Gray a 60-52 edge, the Hoyas’ shots stopped falling for over eight minutes.

The current three-game winning streak has gotten Georgetown back to within one game of .500 in the Big East with three games left. Up next for the Hoyas is a trip to the Carrier Dome for a matchup against rival Syracuse (15-10, 4-8) Sunday at 6 p.m. Georgetown will look to keep the momentum from its hot streak, as confidence is sky-high in the locker room.

“Coming in from a win is so much better than coming in from a loss,” Houlette said. “The atmosphere is better, everybody’s hyped for practice, there’s a good energy [right now].”

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