Third-ranked Indiana University (PA) raced out to a 27-9 first quarter lead on its way to a 72-53 PSAC Western Division victory over the Pitt-Johnstown women's basketball team, Wednesday evening in the Sports Center.   Olivia McCabe's 18 points and seven rebounds led the way for the Cats, who slipped to 7-5 overall and 4-3 in conference-play.
 
The two teams traded layups to start, before the Crimson Hawks went on a 18-4 run capped by Megan Smith's 3-pointer at 3:09 that put IUP in front 20-4.  Pitt-Johnstown answered with back-to-back baskets from Gabrielle Smith to narrow it to 23-9 with just under a minute, but the Crimson Hawks scored the final four points of the quarter to take a 27-9 lead.
 
The Crimson Hawks opened up the second quarter on a 9-0 run, then pushed it out to 40-13 on a Lauren Wolosik bucket at 1:32.  McCabe's layup made it 42-17, before the Crimson Hawks went into the halftime break leading, 44-18.
 
Pitt-Johnstown outscored IUP 10-4 behind Alexis Hartwick's 3-pointer with 6:47 remaining and McCabe added another layup two minutes later to make it 52-33.  McCabe continued to make an impact inside, after grabbing an offensive rebound she drew a foul and made both free-throws, to cut it 54-39.
 
In the fourth quarter, Alexis Harris knocked down two free-throws to narrow the Crimson Hawks lead to 15.  However, that was as close as Pitt-Johnstown could get, and the Crimson Hawks cruised to the 19-point victory.
 
Along with McCabe's 18 points and seven rebounds, Smith had 11 points and seven rebounds, while Moreland tallied eight points and seven rebounds.  The Cats also got eight points from Harris.
           
McCabe currently stands in 13^th-place on the Pitt-Johnstown All-Time Rebounding List with 685 and is now nine points shy of becoming Pitt-Johnstown's 37^th 1,000-point scorer.
 
Pitt-Johnstown ended the night shooting 34.8% (16-46) from the field, 3-12 from behind the arc and 18-26 from the charity stripe.  IUP shot 45.0% (27-60) from the floor, 7-21 from behind the 3-point line, and 11-21 from the charity stripe.
 
Smith poured in a game-high 34 points, including 6-9 shooting from 3-point range, and Carolyn Appleby and Wolosik scored 16 and 12 points, respectively for the Crimson Hawks, who improved to 11-0 overall and 6-0 in the PSAC.
 
The Mountain Cats return to action with a home PSAC doubleheader with the Mountain Cats against Gannon on Saturday at 1 p.m. in the Sports Center, before traveling to conference games at nationally-ranked Edinboro University on Monday and California (PA) on Wednesday.