On Wednesday night, the Alma College Women's Basketball team opened up their MIAA schedule with a road game at Saint Mary's College. The Scots fell behind big early and fought hard to come back, but ultimately fell 64-61 to the Belles.

With the loss, Alma fell to 2-3 overall and 0-1 in the league, while Saint Mary's improved to 3-3 in 2014-15 and 1-0 in the MIAA.

The Scots never led in tonight's contest and after So. F Morgan Seaberg (North Muskegon/North Muskegon) deadlocked the game at 8-8 at the 15:24 mark of the first half, the Belles took command. A 11-0 run gave the home team a 19-8 lead but Alma did outscore SMC 9-2 to close the gap to 21-17 on a lay-up by So. G Tara Padgett (Freeland/Freeland).

However, the Belles then went on a 10-2 run en route to a 34-24 advantage at the halftime break.

In the second half, Saint Mary's cruised along pretty well through most of the first 10 minutes and looked as though they would earn a comfortable win. SMC led 45-33 at 13:22 and then by nine at 51-42 with 8:54 remaining in the game, however the Scots did not give up easily.

A 7-1 Alma run ended with a lay-up by Padgett with 7:05 left in the game and the Scots were down just three, at 52-49. A six point run over the next 1:30 gave the Belles a 58-49 advantage but Alma cut the deficit to one, at 60-59, when Sr. G Grace Wheeler (St. Ignace/LaSalle) hit two free throws with 99 ticks of the clock remaining.

However, the Belles were not to be denied as they scored the next four points and only allowed two Alma free throws with just one second remaining. The final burst gave the home team the hard-fought three-point margin of victory.

The Scots had three players finish in double digit scoring - Padgett with 12, Sr. G Morgan Henry (Wayland/Wayland Union) with 11 and Wheeler with 10. Seaberg had a team-high eight rebounds to go with five points and two blocks, while Henry added six rebounds in the loss.

Alma will host Hope College at Art Smith Arena on Saturday afternoon. Tip-off is scheduled to begin at 3:00 p.m.