Jasmine McDonald scored 14 points and had nine rebounds however; it could not lift Mount Olive past the No. 18 Rollins College Tars as they fall 59-42 in the Tars Holiday Classic in Winter Park, Florida. Kirksten Mitchell added 11 points and Ty Wallace had four points and six rebounds as well for Mount Olive. The Trojan performance would not be enough, as they were not able to take the lead in the second half. The Tars' lead would be as high as 17 and shrink to as small as 6 in the second period.
The Mount Olive College Trojans (5-3) held the high scoring Rollins (9-2) offense to 26 points in the first half. Rollins had been averaging 32 points in the first half.
Both teams kept the first half close trading the lead six times. Mitchell used a four-point play with 7:36 remaining to give Mount Olive the 14-12 lead.
Gabby Griffin grabbed an offensive rebound and with the put back bucket pushed the Trojans to their largest lead of the first half 16-12 with 6:06 remaining.
A three pointer by Sarah Blackburn put Rollins back in the lead 19-16 with 4:21.
McDonald after a made free throw, drove into the paint and put up a jumper to tie the game up at 19 with 2:22.
A jumper by Ashley Losch broke the tie with 2:12. After Sarah Blackburn hit two free throws she extend the Tars lead to four 23-19.
Mitchell used the feed from Anamaria Zajcic to bring the Trojans back to within two; 59 seconds remaining in the first half.
However, the Tars Jaquar Westbrooks converted a three-point play to push the lead to five 26-21.
The second half would not see a Mount Olive lead as the Tars' lead did not get lower than six and never traded hands.
McDonald hit a long three pointer off a Joneiqua Gary assist bringing the Tars lead down to seven, 38-31 with 13:37, but that is as close as Mount Olive would get as Rollins began to pull away.
Rollins scored on the next four possessions, which extended their lead to 15, 46-31, their second largest of the game with 9:04.
The Tars lead did not drop below 10 for the rest of the game and grew to as large as 17.
McDonald scored the last points of the contest on a drive into the paint as the layup would go with eight seconds left in the game 59-42.
For Mount Olive, Katie Paschal also had seven points and three rebounds. Mount Olive went 16-for-63 (25.4%) from the field.
For Rollins, the top scorer was Sarah Blackburn, with 14 points and nine rebounds. Losch (12) and Emmalee Schill (11) both posted double figures as well. Rollins went 20-for-49 (40.8%) from the field.
Mount Olive will play the Lady Blues of Bluefield State tomorrow afternoon in Warden Arena in their final game of the Tars Holiday Classic. Tip-off is scheduled for 4:00pm.