GALLATIN, Tenn.—Senior Emily Wilson (Quincy, Ill.) scored 19 of her game-high 24 points in the first half as Webster University built a 14-point lead before holding off a late rally to defeat Babson College, 74-66, in the Music City Classic on Thursday afternoon inside the Welch College Student Activities Center. 

Babson drops to 4-4 on the year with the loss, while Webster improves to 8-0 with its 33rd consecutive regular season victory. 

Sophomore Samantha Reale (North Attleboro, Mass.) scored 21 points on 7-of-14 shooting to go along with nine rebounds, four assists and two steals to pace the Beavers. Graduate student Toni Thompson (Newbury Park, Calif.), who was making her Babson debut, and seniors Emily Flynn (Hanover, Mass.) and Katelyn Mollica (Foxborough, Mass.) all scored nine points, classmate Camilla Silk (Medfield, Mass.) added eight points and eight boards, and junior Allessia Carlo (Carmel, N.Y.) led all players with six assists in the loss. 

Graduate student Bethany Lancaster (Buffalo, Mo.) posted a double-double with 20 points and 12 rebounds to go along with three steals, while sophomore Rylee Denbow (Cottleville, Mo.) finished with 15 points and four rebounds for the Gorloks. 

Wilson, who started 6-of-6 from the floor, had 12 first-quarter points and scored five more as part of a 7-0 run to start the second as Webster extended its advantage to 27-16. The Gorloks took their largest lead of the game at 32-18 with 4:52 to go in the stanza and answered a 6-0 run by the Green and White with four straight free throws to push the margin back to 36-24 at halftime. 

Down 11 less than two minutes into the third quarter, the Beavers used an 11-5 spurt that included five points from Reale to pull within 46-41 on a layup by Carlo at the 5:19 mark. Reale answered a three-point play by Lancaster with a pair of free throws to make it 50-45 but Denbow canned a pair of triples over the final 94 seconds of the period and opened the fourth with another bucket as part of a 14-5 burst that helped the Gorloks match their largest lead of the afternoon at 64-50 with 8:18 to go in the contest. 

Babson made one final push getting hoops from Reale, Mollica and Thompson to cut its deficit to 64-56 with 5:09 remaining only to see Webster answer with baskets on three consecutive possessions to extend the margin back to 13 with just over three minutes left. 

The Beavers finished with a 41-36 edge on the glass and outscored the Gorloks 38-30 in the paint, but shot just 35.4 percent from the floor and 2-of-16 from beyond the arc. Webster shot 46.9 percent from the floor and scored 26 points off 21 Babson turnovers. 

Both teams wrap up the tournament on Friday as the Beavers face Franklin & Marshall at 2 p.m. EST, while the Gorloks meet Lynchburg at 6 p.m. EST. 

GAME NOTES
•    Thursday's game was the first all-time between Babson and Webster and the first played by the Beavers in the state of Tennessee. 
•    Babson has now outrebounded seven of its first eight opponents on the year.
•    The Beavers made a season-high 18 free throws and shot 81.8 percent at the line in Thursday's loss. 
•    Reale now has at least one steal in 17 straight games, a streak that includes multiple steals in each of the last six contests.