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Pictured Above: Junior guard Jordyn Peck (photo by Molly Riley)

Newark, NJ – A gallant comeback bid that saw the Wagner women's basketball team cut a 20-point second-half deficit to three came up a bit short as the Seahawks dropped a 60-54 decision at NJIT.
 
The prolific backcourt combination of sophomore guard Jasmine Nwajei (Rockaway Park, N Y/Murry Bergtraum) and junior guard Jordyn Peck (Shaker Heights, OH/Shaker Heights pearheaded the Seahawk comeback, as Nwajei tallied 12 of her game-high 20 points in the second half, while Peck knocked in 13 of her 15 points over the final 20 minutes.
 
After taking a 33-21 lead at the intermission, the Highlanders opened the second half with a 10-2 run in opening their biggest lead of the game at 43-23 with 13:45 to play on a layup by Nicole Maticka.
 
Wagner then went on a 19-6 run over the next 8:03, capped by a aPeck three-point jumper at the 5:42 mark that drew the Seahawks to within five at 49-44. After NJIT scored the next four points to make it 53-44, Wagner ran off five straight points on a Nwajei layup followed by a three-pointer from sophomore wing Maria Conyers-Jordan (Philadelphia, PA/Friends' Central), to make it a 53-49 game with 3:13 left.
 
Nwajei then sank a pair of free throws at the 2:50 mark to make it a 7-0 run and a three-point game at 54-51. This is the closest Wagner the score had been since NJIT led 5-2 less than four minutes into the game. This would be as close as the Seahawks would get, however, as the Highlanders scored the last nine points of the game, with seven of them coming from the free throw line as Wagner was forced to foul.
 
With the loss, the Seahawks fall to 0-6 on the season while NJIT improves to 4-4.
 
Peck scored 13 of her 15 points in the second half while Conyers-Jordan, making her first start of the season and third of her career, matched her career high with nine points on 4-of-6 shooting.
 
NJIT was led by power forward Leah Horton who registered team highs with 15 points and eight rebounds, while Maticka and Alana Dudley added 13 points each.
 
The Highlanders outshot Wagner 42%-36% but the Seahawks were much better in the second half, shooting 48% in the final 20 minutes after hitting just 27% in the opening stanza. The rebounding numbers were dead even at 34 apiece.
 
Wagner is next in action on Sunday, December 7 when the Seahawks make the long trek to State College, PA to meet Big 10 member Penn State in a 2:00 pm tip.
 
NOTES
With her 15 points tonight, Peck is now up to 925 career points, just 75 shy of becoming the 24^th player in Seahawk history to reach the 1,000-point mark. The nine points by Conyers-Jordan equaled her previous career best of nine which came on this same floor at the Fleisher Athletic Arena. In last season's meeting vs. NJIT here, on December 30, 2013, the 5-9 wing recorded the first nine-point game of her career.