Photo Courtesy of Ellman Photography

ARLINGTON, Texas – Turnovers and fouls plagued the Northern Arizona women's basketball team on Wednesday night, leading to a halftime deficit and an eventual 80-62 loss to UT Arlington as their record dropped to 2-3.

"We came out wanting to play 40 great minutes of defense and through the first five to 10 minutes, we did that but we ended up fouling way too much," said head coach Sue Darling. "We got into foul trouble early and it got us out of our rhythm offensively. We also turned the ball over too much, particularly in the first half, and the problems were two-fold."

Junior transfer Mariah Willadsen had her best scoring game as a Lumberjack, scoring 10 points and she was joined in double-figures by freshman Tori Lloyd who also chipped in 10. Eleven of the 12 Lumberjacks on the roster also scored in the game.

After the Mavericks scored the first five points of the game, the Lumberjacks answered with a corner three-pointer by sophomore Rene Coggins and a driving floater by Willadsen. NAU kept pace with the Mavericks and took its first lead. 14-13, of the game with 13:23 left in the first half when senior Erikka Banks drove to the basket and converted on a three-point play.

UTA reclaimed the lead for good with a five-point spurt to break a 16-16 tie, but NAU hung close trailing by just five at 29-24 following a Banks layup with 5:24 before the half. However, the 'Jacks did not score again until junior Madi Austin hit two free throws with 17 seconds left to snap a 12-0 UTA run as the Mavs took a 41-26 lead into halftime.

Although NAU shot 47.6 percent from the field in the first half, the Lumberjacks were hurt by 17 turnovers in the first 20 minutes which led to a 19-2 UT Arlington edge in points off turnovers. The 'Jacks also committed 15 fouls that led to 19 free throw attempts for the home team.

Down at the half, NAU came out strong and scored the first four points of the second half following a pair of free throws each by Banks and Coggins. Sophomore Brittani Lusain's triple cut the Lumberjack deficit to 12 at 45-33 two and a half minutes into the half, but unfortunately NAU could not get any closer the rest of the way. The Lumberjacks were able to cut their turnover total by nearly half in the second half and they outshot the Mavericks by a narrow margin (43.5-43.3 percent) in the final 20 minutes, yet their halftime deficit proved to be too much to overcome.

"We were too tentative in the first half and while they got to the free-throw line a lot in the first, we felt we could get to the free-throw line in the second half," Darling said. "Our strategy was to try to score with the clock stopped to get out of the hole. Our players that came off the bench did a nice job and we got some of them quality minutes and that's what we take away tonight."

Austin had her best game as a Lumberjack so far this season, playing a season-high 21 minutes off the bench and scoring six points in addition to pulling down five rebounds, tied with Banks for the team-lead.

Both teams shot nearly identical percentages for the game with UTA at 45.8 percent and NAU at 45.5 percent and the Lumberjacks shot a better percentage at the line, going 19-for-26 (73.1 percent) from the charity stripe. The Lumberjacks also outrebounded the Mavs, 34-32, but was ultimately hurt by 27 turnovers, which led to 33 points for UTA.

NAU returns home to host Fort Lewis College at 2 p.m. on Saturday in the Rolle Activity Center.