Playing their first MAAC conference home game of the season, the Quinnipiac women’s basketball team fell to the Fairfield Stags 66 – 62 at the People’s United Center Monday evening.

The Stags were in command of the lead for a majority of the game, taking the lead late in the second quarter and holding it until the buzzer, but the Bobcats kept on chipping away and never let the deficit get out of hand.  The victory marks the first victory for Fairfield in Hamden since Quinnipiac became a Division I school in 2013.

It was a very balanced scoring effort for Quinnipiac with eight Bobcats in the scoring column, led by senior guard Mackenzie DeWees, who had 14 points on 5-10 shooting and grabbed seven rebounds. Junior guard Sajada Bonner joined DeWees in double figures with 12 points drilling four of her seven three-point attempts and consistently found herself open on the perimeter.

Junior forwards Mikala Morris and Cur’Tiera Haywood each scored 8 points and had 6 rebounds and played tough defense denying the ball inside all game.

“I think our team is just really talented, especially Mikala (Morris), CT (Haywood), Amani (Free), people just suck into the zone and I stand behind them like ‘I’m open’ and it just works out,” Bonner said.

Fairfield played a zone defense all throughout and forced 14 Quinnipiac turnovers as the Bobcats were struggling to find open lanes and good looks.

The Stags were led by senior forward Lou Lopez-Senechal, who entered the game as the leading scorer in points per game in the MAAC at 18.1 and scored a game high 26 points on 10-23 shooting. Graduate senior guard Sydney Lowery and senior forward Andrea Hernangomez joined Lopez-Senechal in double figures with 13 and 11 points, respectively. Lowery grabbed 10 rebounds as well to notch the first double-double of her career.

“Lou is a heck of a basketball player,” said DeWees. “We came in together as freshmen and it’s been great playing against each other and guarding each other these past four years.”

Coach Tricia Fabbri had props for Farfield, saying “Credit Fairfield, I thought they were really well prepared and well coached, and I thought they executed a great defensive game plan.”

Fabbri went with a different look lineup wise early on in the first half with 13 different Bobcats logging minutes in just the first quarter.

“I thought tonight, coming in, our first five have been logging a lot of minutes and it’s something in practice where everybody has been competing and contributing that the first quarter was a good time to get everybody a taste,” Fabbri said.

After a short break, the Bobcats will head on the road to take on the St. Peter’s Peacocks on Thursday, December 30 at 7 p.m. at the Yanitelli Center as they look to get back in the win column.