For the second game in a row, the Park University Gilbert women's basketball team squandered a lead going into the fourth quarter and fell to UC Merced 72-62 at the Joseph E. Gallo Center in Merced, Calif. The Bucs fall to 0-2 in the conference and 2-2 overall. Merced moves to 3-0 in conference (3-5 overall).

The first quarter saw the Bucs take a 16-11 advantage despite only shooting 29 percent from the floor. This was offset by a perfect 8-8 from the free throw line and forcing eight Merced turnovers. Macy Markus led the way with six points.

The second quarter saw Park Gilbert up its lead to as large as 11, but another poor shooting quarter allowed the Bobcats to completely erase the deficit by halftime, finishing with a 7-0 run. Both teams could not be pleased with their shooting as the Bucs shot 29 percent for the half and the Bobcats shot 30 percent.  

The second half saw the Bobcats come out like a house a fire with another 7-0 run to start the frame to take a 38-31 advantage. But the Bucs responded in kind with a 16-5 run of their own to take a five-point lead. The teams would go back and forth the rest of the quarter and the Bucs would go into the final stanza with a four-point 52-48 lead after Merced hit a three-pointer as time expired in the quarter. The Bucs improved to 53 percent from the floor, while UC Merced also improved to 46 percent.

Another story of this game was fouls. The officials were calling the game tight both ways as both squads had players foul out early. Merced in the third quarter and Madison Chappell and Jazmyne Jenkins for the Bucs early in the fourth. Players on both squads had to spend a good amount of time on the bench due to being in foul trouble. Markus spent most of the third and fourth quarter on the bench and shortly after returning picked up her fifth foul and was done for the evening.

The fourth quarter saw Park Gilbert revert back to its shooting percentage of the first half as it shot 29 percent again in the fourth quarter and only scored 10 points. Merced scored 24 points in the quarter and ran away with the contest winning comfortably by 10.

The other story the Buccaneers will not want to hear about is rebounds. The Bobcats dominated the boards outrebounding the Buccaneers by 12 boards, 40-28. They were particularly effective on the offensive glass with 13, which turned into 10 second chance points.  Both Buccaneer post players Jenkins and Valerie Van Dijk were battling foul issues and without them, rebounds seemed to always end up in the hands of a Bobcat player.

Kayla Schroeder attempted to keep the Buccaneers in the contest. She scored seven of the 10 points in the fourth and led the team with 23 points, just one point off of her career high as she played 40 minutes for the second game in a row. Van Dijk led the Bucs with 10 rebounds.

Park Gilbert hopes some home cooking and the hopeful return of point guard Jayla Reliford can reverse some of their fortunes as they hope to get back to .500 in the conference.  The Buccaneers will face off with Antelope Valley on Thursday, December 8 at 5:30 p.m. MST before hosting a non-conference game with the University of Providence on Friday, December 9 (5:30 p.m. MST) and then finish out the week with another home conference contest with La Sierra on December 11 (12 p.m. MST).