GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. - The women's basketball team hosted Missouri-St. Louis on Saturday afternoon and the visiting Tritons picked up a 61-43 win in non-conference action. DU and UMSL were both playing back-to-back games as the Tritons dropped a game yesterday at Grand Valley State and the Panthers fell to Maryville.

The Panthers were forced to claw back into the game after struggling in the first quarter and first half to score. The Tritons led 19-9 after one quarter and shot 46.7 percent from the floor. DU went 3-for-15 shooting in the opening quarter. In the second quarter, the defense picked it up holding UMSL to six points on 3-of-18 shooting. However, DU went 1-of-10 and found themselves down 25-15 at halftime.

The Panthers came out in the second half with some energy and scored the first five points on a basket by Scout Nelson and a three-pointer by Toni Grace. The Panthers kept it close and trailed 28-26 with 3:20 left in the third after a jumper by Grace. Davenport cut the deficit to one twice in the quarter but the Tritons closed out the quarter on a 5-0 run to lead 37-31.

The run continued into the fourth quarter for UMSL built a 50-31 lead to cap off an 18-0 run which stopped at the 6:35 mark of the fourth. That run left the Panthers with a tall mountain to climb and they would fall by the 18-point margin. Grace led the team with 16 points and went 4-of-8 behind the arc. Nelson scored 10 points and also had six rebounds, three assists and two steals. DU went 15-of-18 at the free throw line.