WOMEN’S HOOPS Hoyas Fall to Wildcats By Julie Wood Hoya Staff Writer

For the fifth time in six games, the Georgetown women’s basketball team failed to meet the challenge of its opponent. The Hoyas fell to 12-13, 4-10 in the Big East for the season after its 59-46 loss to Villanova (16-9, 10-4 Big East) Wednesday night.

“Each year in the Big East, there are teams with match-up strengths, and we’re not the only team that doesn’t match up with Villanova,” Head Coach Pat Knapp said. “You have the team that you have.”

The Wildcats had a team of long-range shooters Wednesday, as they were 9-for-29 from beyond the three-point line. Junior guard Trish Juhline broke the school record for career three-pointers with her 190th. She led the Wildcats with 18 points on the night.

“If we stood outside and took three’s all day, we might shoot 3-for-29. That’s not the cards that we have or the hand that we’ve been dealt. We have to guard them to the best of our ability, which is hard to do,” Knapp said.

Sophomore forward Rebekkah Brunson paced the Hoyas with 15 points and eight rebounds before fouling out with 1:19 remaining. Freshman point guard Mary Lisicky added 12 points on 4-for-4 three-point shooting.

Junior forward Nok Duany, who is averaging 12.3 points for the Hoyas, was sidelined with an ankle injury sustained during practice this week. She is expected to play in tomorrow’s matchup against Notre Dame.

The Hoyas have been continually hampered by injuries throughout the 2002 season. They lost Brunson for several weeks to a stress fracture, as well as sophomore forward Varda Tamoulianis and junior guard Joi Irby for the season.

Losing Duany limited the Hoyas to a seven-woman roster – six after Brunson left the game.

Villanova started with a three-guard lineup, which would ordinarily give the Hoyas the advantage in the low post. But without Duany, their inside presence was limited.

“It did trim down the front line,” Knapp said.

The Hoyas scored 14 points in the paint compared the Wildcats’ 20. They were also outrebounded, 39-30.

“We’re not a three-point shooting machine. We have to try to get it inside. We have to rebound a lot better than we did. You have to look at those rebounding stats and say, `How did that happen?’ Thirteen offensive rebounds for Villanova hurt us,” Knapp said.

Knapp said he felt that Georgetown’s low post presence was limited by the physical play of Villanova.

“I don’t like the way our post players are being handled inside. We only went to the foul line eight times; I think that’s horrible,” he said. The Hoyas average 17.5 free throw attempts per game. “I really can’t believe how often we’re pushed when we shoot or post up inside.”

The Hoyas were up by as many as five in the first five minutes, but the Wildcats quickly took off. They went on a nine-point run on three three-pointers and three Georgetown turnovers.

“We have to make our possessions count, and I don’t think we did that in the first half,” Knapp said.

Villanova took a 36-25 lead into the locker room at halftime. The second half saw Georgetown make a run at the lead, but never come closer than three points. The Hoyas were down by 14 with 17:27 to go but worked their way back to 38-41 at the 12:51 mark.

“I thought we stepped it up more defensively. We took better care of our possessions,” Knapp said. “We got the ball in certain places. We got it inside.”

However, Villanova took a timeout and got back on track. Seventeen points was their biggest lead of the game.

The Hoyas have two games remaining in the regular season. They face No. 22 Notre Dame tomorrow in their final home game. The defending national champion Fighting Irish are 18-7, 12-2 in the Big East. The Hoyas also travel to face Seton Hall on Feb. 26. They previously lost to the Pirates 64-45.

“We need to defend better and rebound better. We still have to do those two things better to beat Notre Dame and to beat Seton Hall, and that’s it. I’d like us to do some different things offensively, but we only have so many tools,” Knapp said.

Tip-off against the Irish will be at 4 p.m. tomorrow in cDonough Gymnasium.