Beaver Falls, Pa.— The Franciscan University women's basketball team started play in the Geneva College Tournament Friday night with a game against Houghton College. Franciscan fell to the Highlanders 75-41.

Head coach Suzy Delaney said that tonight they had a very small bench with only 7 girls; hurting their depth but also giving all the FUS girls a chance to get a taste of the game. She also said that the girls were still a little rusty coming off of their Christmas break but that she is looking forward to pushing forward and gaining momentum.

This was the first game back for the FUS team after a ten-day break for Christmas. It was also junior Hannah Flanagan's first game back, after spending the fall semester abroad.

Although the team gained Flanagan for this game it was missing two of its starters, Monica Dawyot and Amy O'Keefe. Dawyot wasn't able to return from her break and O'Keefe is studying abroad for the remainder of the season.

In the absence of Dawyot, sophomore Helen Raines stepped in to take over the point guard position and continued to be a solid player for the team scoring 16 points. Fellow sophomore Lacy Huck also continued to play consistently, racking up 17 points and 12 rebounds, her fifth double-double of the season.

Despite the consistency of Raines and Huck FUS was plagued by turnovers throughout the game with 26 overall and an inconsistent defense allowed Houghton to take control.

Houghton dictated the tempo for much of the game with Franciscan's biggest statistical advantage coming from the free throw line; topping the Highlanders free throw percentage 80 percent to 60 percent.

"Coming off of this game we know we have to keep moving forward and learn what to improve on," Delaney said. "Luckily we don't have a lot of time to recover and get to go right back out on the court tomorrow."

The Franciscan team is now 3-7 on the season and 2-2 in the Allegheny Mountain Collegiate Conference. They continue play in the Geneva Tournament Saturday when they play Geneva College at 4 p.m.