Not many have ever accused men's basketball coach John Chaney for looking pretty, but the man wins at Temple.

The No. 20 Penn State (2-5) women's lacrosse team won 8-5 at Temple (1-3) yesterday, but the win was a little ugly.

"It was one of our worst games all season," Penn State women's lacrosse coach Suzanne Isidor said. "We definitely didn't play well."

The fact still remains that the Nittany Lions won. The win ends a four-game losing skid.

After giving up the first goal of the game Penn State outscored the Owls 5-1 to finish the half with a three-goal lead.

Penn State then opened the second half up with three more goals to lead 8-2, but did not score the rest of the game. The Owls scored three more but could not come all the way back.

"I think sometimes a part was there, and then sometimes it wasn't," said senior midfielder Jamie Donahue, who scored once. "We played down to a lower level instead of playing at ours, which I think is much better."

Seven Penn State players scored goals, and the offense possessed the ball for most of the game. Co-captain Katie Jeschke scored two goals, and both Lori Havrilla and Katie Hartman had a goal and two assists each.

Turnovers again plagued the Nittany Lions.

"We did a good job of having longer possessions and playing defense," Isidor said. "We just had a lot of turnovers. We didn't play smart lacrosse. The turnovers are our nemesis."

In three of the past four games for Penn State, the opponents were ranked in the top five of the Intercollegiate Women's Lacrosse Coaches Association poll. While playing tough lacrosse, the Nittany Lions just could not win the close games. Isidor hopes that this win will help jump-start the team that was once ranked as high as No. 9.

"Even though we weren't really proud of the way we played, it was nice to get on the winning track," she said. "We tasted victory and hopefully it will carry us into Maryland on Friday."

Junior goalkeeper Lee Tortorelli had nine saves and four caused turnovers, putting back-to-back solid efforts after recording 12 saves against No. 1 Princeton on Saturday.

The Nittany Lions travel to College Park, Md., to play No. 8 Maryland (5-2) on Friday.