The Lady Statesmen of Marshall HS defeated Falls Church on the Lady Jags home court, dropping the home team to a 1-4 record. Encouraged by improved point production in their previous game, all but one Falls Church shooter found great difficulty in scoring points. The lone exception was Leah Shaw, who hit each of her first four three-point attempts tonight which established the highest single-game total for that long distance shot by a Falls Church freshman in recent memory, and the most by any classman since Jenny Vique landed 5 in a game during her senior year two seasons ago.

That performance was not enough to offset all the turnovers, travel violations, and personal fouls that beset the Lady Jags throughout this game. Marshall opened the game by outscoring the Lady Jags 8-2 in the first quarter. Falls Church snapped out of its scoring coma in the second quarter with 10 points, but Marshall widened its lead by one more to 7 at the half. Shaw's first two "3s" were a highlight of that half as was junior Leann Loch's 11 rebounds in a ten-minute stretch of that half. But serious foul trouble  and an 0-4 team performance at the foul stripe frustrated Falls Church.

Regardless of all the obstacles the Lady Jags had thrown in front of themselves, the game was still within reach by the closing seconds of the third quarter with Marshall up by seven, but when their point guard banked in a very long-distance "3" at the buzzer to put the Lady Statesmen up by 10, one could not help but harbor the feeling that the visitors had "it" and the home team did not.

Falls Church was forced to open the final quarter with their work cut out for them. Work they did, nearly tripling their third quarter points and improving their foul shots with 5 out of 6 free throws by juniors Amber Ecelbarger and Leann Loch, the latter snagging three more rebounds and the former sending two passes to Shaw who hit two more open-look "3s" to cut the Marshall lead in half with two minutes to play, but the Lady Statesman who landed only 2 of 8 foul shots in the first three quarters, found success with six of their final eight foul shots in the final frame to preserve their win.

Scoring Summary: Leah Shaw, 12 points; Natalie Samaha, 6 points; Amber Ecelbarger, 5 points; Leann Loch, 4 points.