DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. – The Embry-Riddle women's basketball team suffered its second road loss of the season, falling to Tampa (2-3) 73-59 at the Spartans' Bob Martinez Athletics Complex on Tuesday. Sabrina Whiting and Mercedes Jorge paced the Eagle offense, scoring 17 points apiece as ERAU moves to 2-2 on the year.
 
The Eagles outscored the Spartans 6-2 in the first four minutes of play and behind a six-point output from Mercedes Jorge led the home team 13-10 at the end of the first quarter.
 
The start of the second period saw Sabrina Whiting and Ashley McWilliams drill back-to-back treys to help the Blue and Gold open up a 21-12 lead, which they eventually increased to 10 points (23-13). Midway through the quarter, however, the tide turned as Tampa scored, unanswered, on four straight possessions to cut the lead to 23-21. A pair of Taylor Cyphers free throws and a Kalah Martin three widened the margin to five, but two successful attempts at the charity stripe by Elena De Alfredo keyed an 8-0 Tampa run that allowed the Spartans to take over the lead and take a 31-28 advantage in the halftime break.
 
After Whiting drilled a three at the beginning of the third quarter to cut the lead to two (33-31), the Spartans went on a 9-3 run to widen the gap to 42-34. Over the next two minutes, the Eagles' pressure on defense helped limit Tampa to just one layup. Meanwhile, ERAU knocked down a three-pointer sandwiched between five made free throws to pull within a point (44-43). But Taylor Mcvey had the hot hand in the third quarter and her 15 points in that period helped the Spartans increase their lead to 53-46.
 
In the fourth quarter, free throws were the difference as the Spartans made good on 10 of their 18 trips to the charity stripe, while the Eagles were just 2-for-2, resulting in the 73-59 final score.
 
"I'm extremely proud of our team," ERAU Head Coach Lisa Nuxol-Wilson said. "Tampa is a very good program, just like all of the teams in the Sunshine State Conference, and for us to compete the way we did on the road shows how much we have improved. We want to improve every game as our players continue to build this young program and I feel that we are doing that.
 
"We had a positive assist to turnover ratio and made some big plays tonight, but we had some break downs defensively in the second quarter and they hit some big shots in the fourth quarter. We will continue to work on consistency with our young team and that will help us down the road." 
 
The Eagles return to action on Friday when they host Puerto Rico – Mayaguez at the ICI Center in the Bahama House/Best Western Aku Tiki Classic.