NEW YORK – First-year tandem Kaitlyn Davis and Abbey Hsu scored 16 points apiece but were unable to carry the Columbia women's basketball team to victory, as Yale exploded for 50 second-half points to pull away from the Lions, 85-60, Friday night at Levien Gymnasium.
 
Columbia (10-6, 1-2 Ivy) was dealt its first home loss since November 10 as its program-record-tying seven-game home winning streak was snapped. Yale (13-3, 3-0 Ivy) remained undefeated in league play and improved to 6-2 this season on the road.
 
"I knew this was going to be a tough game," Columbia head coach Megan Griffith said. "I think Yale's a nice program … It's tough. It was very disappointing to see how we started the third quarter and to me that set the tone for the rest of it. Yale just fed off of it and pounced and credit to them."
 
After Columbia scored the opening bucket of the second half to make it a one-point game, Yale put together an 11-0 run that forced Coach Griffith to call for time. Davis earned a couple of trips to the charity stripe to temporarily stop the bleeding, but back-to-back threes by Roxy Barahman and Tori Andrew ballooned the lead to 17.
 
"I didn't love our response," Griffith added. "We talked a lot about adversity and you have to have a response. That dictates the outcome. We just had zero response and I think that was the tale of the second half."
 
The Lions got within a dozen heading to the fourth quarter and that would be as close as it got the rest of the night. Yale put together a 16-0 run to lead by as many as 29 before the night was over.
 
Columbia's rookie duo did its part to keep the Lions in the game. Hsu was 6-of-12 from the field and 4-of-7 from beyond the arc, giving her at least 15 points in each of her first three Ivy League games. The Parkland, Florida native also came up with three steals. Davis was a force on the glass with a game-high eight rebounds and bullied her way to 16 points behind a 6-of-7 showing at the foul line.
 
"We're both still learning," said Hsu, who has been named Ivy League Rookie of the Week twice this season. "We have great captains, great teammates around us. They push us in practice every day and we try to do the best that we can."
 
Despite their individual performances, both newcomers know the key to turning things around for Saturday's game against Brown will come on the defensive end.
 
"We needed to be able to string together stops on defense and we didn't," Davis said. "That's what makes or breaks the game. We just have to play better defense."
 
Yale was led by senior Roxy Barahman, who scored a game-high 20 points on 6-of-13 shooting. Tori Andrew was 6-for-6 from the perimeter on her way to 19 points. Camilla Emsbo (12) and Ellen Margaret Andrews (11) rounded out the double-figure scorers.
 
The Lions recovered from a 10-0 Yale start to level things up by the end of the first quarter. An old-fashioned 3-point play from Davis in the final minute made it a 15-all game heading to the second.
 
Rebounding was big for the Lions in the first half. They used an 8-1 run sparked by back-to-back buckets from Lilian Kennedy to take a 30-25 lead with less than three minutes until halftime. At the time, Columbia was outrebounding Yale 19-9. The Lions would only come up with 10 rebounds through the second half.
 
Columbia gets a chance to redeem itself in less than 24 hours, hosting Brown (6-10, 0-3 Ivy) Saturday evening at 5 p.m. The game will air live on SportsNet New York (SNY).
 
For the latest on the Columbia women's basketball program, follow @CULionsWBB on Twitter and Instagram, on Facebook at Facebook.com/ColumbiaWBB, on the web at GoColumbiaLions.com.