MIAMI GARDENS, Fla. – The Embry-Riddle women's basketball team suffered a tough loss in Sun Conference play on Thursday, falling to defending conference regular season champion St. Thomas 60-57. The Eagles will take a 9-5 overall record and a 1-3 mark in league play into their rematch with conference leader Webber International at 5 p.m. on Saturday at the ICI Center.
 
The Eagles took a 10-4 lead to start the contest and built the advantage to 10 points (20-10) with 10:34 left in the half.
 
At the 10:24 mark Tommoriya Hamm connected on a jumper and that triggered an 11-2 run that cut the Eagle lead to just one point, 22-21. Over the next three minutes neither team could add to its tally. At the 4:28 mark Mercedes Jorge drove to the basket to end the scoring drought and put the Eagles up 24-21, but Claudia Martin answered for the Lady Bobcats on the other end, and with 2:24 remaining in the half, reigning Sun Conference Player of the Week Dannisha Pierce finished a Antishia Wright feed to give STU its first lead of the game (25-24).
 
The Eagles were plagued by miscues in the latter part of the half, turning the ball over on five of their last six possessions. Pierce's seventh and eighth points of the game put the Lady Bobcats up 27-24. Jorge tried to answer for the Eagles at the other end, but her three-point attempt rimmed out and the home team took the three-point lead into the halftime break.
 
The ball-handling miscues continued to pile up for the Blue and Gold at the start of the second half. After missing their first two shots of the half, the Eagles turned the ball over on their next four possessions, which allowed the Lady Bobcats to grow their lead to eight (36-28) with 15:22 left to play.
 
Following the first media timeout of the half, Jorge was fouled and made both free throws to close the gap to six. The Lady Bobcats failed to produce any offense on their next trip down the court and after knocking down one of two free throws, Whiting swiped the ball from Cleyder Blanco and Cyphers finished the play with a layup to make it a three-point game (36-33).
 
With 11:34 left, Pierce put the Lady Bobcats back up by five (40-35), but Whiting finished a layup and, after a STU miss she got the ball again, this time on the right wing, and she knocked down her first three of the night to knot the score at 40-40.
 
Whiting continued to be active on both ends of the floor as she corralled an STU miss and got the ball to Jorge on the inside. Jorge battled under the basket and after pulling down her second offensive rebound of the possession, she got the ball back out to Whiting who drilled her second three to give the Blue and Gold its first lead of the half.
 
Over the next three and a half minutes, the Eagles held the Lady Bobcats to just two points while building an eight-point advantage, but as was the case in the first half, St. Thomas was able to erase the deficit and reclaimed the lead (59-57) on a Desanta Franklin-Jordan layup with 29 seconds left.
 
On their next trip down the court, the Eagles turned the ball over again and St. Thomas hit one of two from the charity stripe to make the score 60-57. With four seconds left Whiting lined up another shot from beyond the arc, but this time ball wouldn't fall and St. Thomas grabbed the rebound to secure the win.
 
Pierce led all scorers, tallying 20 points, six rebounds, four steals and three assists for a St. Thomas team that improved to 11-3 overall and 4-0 in the conference.
 
Jorge recorded her fourth double-double of the year with 15 points and 13 rebounds to lead the Eagles. Kalah Martin contributed 14 points and seven boards, while Whiting and Cyphers added 13 and 10 points, respectively.