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PROVIDENCE, R.I. - The Duquesne women's basketball team dropped a 67-56 decision to Providence on Sunday afternoon. The Dukes fall to 7-5 while the Friars improve to 4-7.

Duquesne was led by Belma Nurkic with 11 points and Olivia Bresnahan with 10. Jose-Ann Johnson tied the game-high with eight rebounds.

Providence's Alexis Harris scored a game-high 19 points on 8-of-10 shooting. Sarah Beal added 10 for the Friars. Aliyah Miller had eight rebounds.

The Dukes took their first lead of the game at 6-5 on a give-and-go from Deva'Nyar Workman and Bresnahan at 15:58. This was part of an 11-2 run over seven minutes that gave Duquesne a 13-7 advantage midway through the half. The Friars would score 11 of the next 13 points to take the lead on Allegra Botteghi's 3-pointer play which made the score at 18-15 with 3:25 remaining. Beal's layup with 39 seconds remaining gave PC their largest lead of the half - six points at 25-19. Amadea Szamosi closed out the 1st half scoring with a layup, sending the game into halftime with the Friars ahead 25-21.

A coast-to-coast layup from Beal gave Providence a 10-point lead at 34-24 heading into the under 16 media timeout of the 2nd half. Providence would maintain a 10-point lead until a pair of foul shots by Szamosi at the 10:08 mark made the score 40-31. However, a layup from Miller and four straight free throws from Evi Iiskola put Providence up by 15 points at 46-31 with 9:04 remaining. The Friars' lead would get as high as 20 points at 55-35 with 5:08 remaining.

Duquesne would chip away at the lead scoring the next eight points to make the score 55-43 heading into the under 4 media timeout. Workman made it a single-digit lead for Providence when her 3-pointer made the score 59-52 with 1:14 remaining. The teams exchanged four foul shots to keep it a seven point game with 40 seconds left, but this would be as close as Duquesne would come to tying.

"There are days when you are not shooting the ball well and you have to defend," said head coach Dan Burt. "We got good looks at the hoop, they didn't go in. You cannot win when you shoot 26 percent."

Duquesne shot a season-low 26.2 percent (16-of-61).

"We aggressively attacked the basket later in the game and that got us back to a tempo we need to play. Unfortunately we didn't convert enough. "

The Dukes outrebounded the Friars 41-39 and had 18 second chance points to PC's 13.

"We are a good basketball team. This was just a tough day," concluded Coach Burt.

After Christmas, Duquesne concludes non-conference play when they travel to Bethlehem, Pa. to face Lehigh (7-1) . The Mountain Hawks are one of the six non-conference teams that have a top 100 RPI. The game is Dec. 28th at 2:00 p.m.

• Nurkic was perfect from the free throw line, making a career-high six foul shots

• The 21 1st half points was a season-low and only the fourth time in 24 halves this season the Dukes scored under 30 points

• Robinson's consecutive game streak of scoring in double-figure ends at 12 dating back to last season

• Bresnahan tied a season-high with six free throws made