Dayton women off to 1-0 start in A-10 with victory at George Mason

The victory came three days after Dayton beat Division II Cedarville University 94-58 on Thursday at UD Arena for its first victory of the season.

This was the first of 16 A-10 games. The Flyers (2-10, 1-0) play Duquesne (10-4, 0-1) at 6 p.m. Thursday in Pittsburgh. Duquesne lost 70-63 at Rhode Island in its A-10 opener Friday.

It was a back-and-forth game early with Dayton leading 17-15 after the first quarter, 32-27 at halftime and 46-40 after three quarters.

Dayton pushed its lead to 52-42 at the 5:09 mark in the fourth quarter on a layup by Shannon Wheeler and then 61-50 with 4:33 to play on a layup by Sydney Freeman.

George Mason chipped away at Dayton’s lead and trailed 65-63 with under a minute to play and 69-66 with 10 seconds remaining. Anyssa Jones clinched the victory by making two free throws with eight seconds to go.

Freeman led Dayton with 16 points. She made 3 of 6 3-pointers. Jones scored 13 and made 7 of 8 free throws. Shannon Wheeler made 5 of 7 shots from the field and scored 11 points.

George Mason (7-6) fell to 0-1 in the A-10. It was picked to finish 14th in the 15-team league.