SCRANTON, Pa. – The Ithaca College women's basketball team dropped its second game of the year on Saturday, suffering a 65-53 loss to No. 6 Scranton on day two of the Hilton Scranton Poinsettia Classic.
 
Things remained close through the first half of play, but Scranton proved to be too much for the Bombers as the Royals started to pull away in the third quarter.
 
The Bombers and Scranton played a back-and-forth first quarter to start things off, as the score was tied four different times in the first 10 minutes.
 
Junior Cassidy O'Malley netted the first four points of the day for the Bombers, ultimately tying things up with 5:45 left in the quarter. Scranton's Sofia Recupero and Mackenzie Mason hit back-to-back shots for the Royals to take a four-point lead with 3:56 left.
 
The Bombers, however, tied things up with 1:51 left, on a jumper from sophomore Grace Cannon and a layup from O'Malley. Ithaca would go on to take an 11-10 lead at the end of the quarter following a three-point play from Annie Giannone with just 45 seconds left.
 
The score remained close in the opening minutes of the second quarter. Recupero started things off for the Royals with a layup, before Giannone drilled a three less than 30 seconds later. Mason tied things up for Scranton with a layup at the 8:49 mark.
 
The Royals went on to score seven straight points to take a 21-14 lead with 5:11 left in the first half. Emily Sheehan started it off with a layup, followed by a Hannah Kowalski layup. Kowalski then netted a shot from behind the arc and three-pointer.
 
A jumper from O'Malley ended the Royals' run, but Scranton hit back-to-back layups to go up nine points with just over three minutes left in the half.
 
An and-one play from Cannon and a layup from senior Meghan Pickell cut the Royals' advantage to four points, but a three from Bridgette Mann and two free throws from Sheehan put Scranton back up, 30-23, at the half.
 
Scranton came out of the break to score the first six points of the second half, all from Recupero, to take its first double-digit lead of the game.
 
A three from senior Allie Tunick ended the scoring drought for the Bombers and brought the deficit back down to 36-26.
 
Ithaca brought the gap down to nine points, twice, but five straight points from the Royals' pushed it back to 14 points. Scranton took a 47-33 lead with 1:03 left following free throws from Kowalski and Sheehan, as well as a layup from Taylor Rodriguez.
 
Following a three-point play from senior Meghan Mazzella, the Royals ended the third quarter with a Sheehan three with just two seconds left on the clock.
 
Scranton continued to push the issue in the fourth quarter, extended its lead to 55-37 with 7:17 left on a Lily Warhaftig three-pointer.
 
With 3:19 left in the game, an O'Malley jumper brought the gap down to just 12 points, but that is the closest the Bombers would get through the remainder of the game.
 
The Royal's netted seven straight points over the course of a minute, starting with a Mann three at the 2:58 mark. Recupero followed that up with two layups, pushing Scranton's advantage to 64-45 with less than two minutes left.
 
The Bombers closed out the game with six straight points from Giannone, but they could not get any closer as time was not on IC's side.
 
Giannone finished the day with 20 points and three assists and was named Ithaca's MVP for the tournament, while O'Malley scored 18 points. Recupero netted 22 points to lead Scranton to its 8-0 record.
 
The Bombers have a break from competition and are back in action on January 4 at Union for a 5 p.m. contest.