GAME STATS PICTURED ABOVE: Ellie Zeller scored a game-high 18 points in Wheaton's 73-68 overtime loss at North Park on Wednesday night.

Chicago, Ill.- The Wheaton women's basketball team, ranked 20th in the latest D3Hoops.com Top 25, dropped its third straight game on Wednesday night in a 73-68 overtime loss at North Park. Wheaton was held without a field goal for the final three minutes and 28 seconds of regulation as well as the entire overtime period in the loss. Wheaton is now 12-4 overall and 3-3 in CCIW play. North Park improves to 10-7 overall and a similar 3-3 conference mark.

Wheaton shot 37.9% (25-66) from the field, including just 1-12 (8.3%) from beyond the three-point line. Wheaton was 17-26 (65.4%) from the free throw line. North Park shot 44.4% (24-54) from the field and 7-20 (35%) on three-point attempts while shooting 18-23 (78.3%) from the charity stripe.

After trailing 5-0 to start the game, Wheaton recovered to score eight of the next 10 points to take an 8-7 lead five minutes into the game. Wheaton stretched its first half lead to as many as nine points before settling for a 31-25 halftime advantage.

The Thunder opened the second with six straight points to take its biggest lead of the game 37-25, a minute and a half into the second. North Park answered with ten straight points over the next three minutes to make it a single possession game at 37-35. Wheaton held off the Vikings and was able to take a five point lead at 51-46 with 8:14 to play. Again the Vikings responded, this time with nine straight points to take a 55-51 lead at the 5:28 mark.

Trailing by five with five minutes to play, Wheaton ran off seven straight points including four from Ellie Zeller and three points from Katie McDaniels (PICTURED RIGHT) to take a 60-58 lead with 2:05 remaining. Two free throws by Liz Rehberger and a jumper by Nikki Przybyslawski allowed North Park to retake the lead at 62-60 with 1:05 left. Ellie Zeller's free throws tied the game with 44 seconds to play and Wheaton had multiple shots for the win in the final seconds bout couldn't get one to go and the game headed to overtime tied at 62.

The early minutes of overtime saw the lead swing back and forth and Wheaton took its final lead at 66-65 on a pair of Katie McDaniels free throws with 1:40 remaining but the Vikings scored the next six points to take a five point lead that Wheaton could not recover from and pulled away to win 73-68.

Ellie Zeller led four Thunder scorers in double figures with 18 points. Lauren Graham finished with 15 points, Katie McDaniels had 14 and Moriah Reeves finished with 10 points. Maris Hovee grabbed a game-high 15 rebounds.

Wheaton will try to snap its three-game skid on Saturday night when the Thunder host North Central College at 5 PM at King Arena.