ALLENTOWN, Pa. — Not every basketball team is equipped with the personnel to use all 94 feet of the court. The ones that are can dictate tempo and make opponents who like to operate in the halfcourt uncomfortable with pressure so far from the basket.

St. Joseph’s College was forced out of its comfort zone Friday in a 65-47 loss to Christopher Newport in the first round of the NCAA Division III women’s tournament at Muhlenberg College.

The Monks (23-6), champions of the Great Northeast Athletic Conference, struggled to maintain their composure amid the full-court heat generated by the Captains (23-4) of Newport News, Virginia.

Christopher Newport pressed from beginning to end, first employing a 2-2-1 zone defense, then switching to full-court man-to-man.

“We had some film on them so we knew what was coming,” said St. Joseph’s Coach Mike McDevitt. “But it’s one thing to know what’s coming and another thing to combat it.”

The Captains broke a halftime tie by outscoring the Monks 18-6 in the third quarter, when St. Joe’s committed 13 turnovers. In all, the Monks turned the ball over 27 times, enabling the Captains to make 33 trips to the free-throw line.

“Once we got it over halfcourt, we didn’t attack as much as we should have,” said McDevitt. “We’ve seen pressure before but they took it to another level.”

Morgan Cahill, a senior center, scored a team-high 15 points for the Monks and grabbed four rebounds.

“We knew coming in how tenacious their trap was going to be,” said Cahill, a nursing major from Yarmouth who will graduate in May. “Coming into this year, I knew we were going to be such a young team. I can’t say how proud I am of our freshmen and sophomores, and how they were able to step it up. I never imagined we would get this far. If we were going to lose, I’m happy it was on the national stage.”

St. Joseph’s opened on an 8-2 run fueled by a pair of 3-pointers from freshman Kelsi McNamara and junior Emily Kehoe. A Cahill layup midway through the second quarter staked the Monks to a 23-15 lead.

But Christopher Newport closed the half on a 10-2 run to gain momentum and set up its third-quarter surge.

McNamara, the team’s second-leading scorer this season, added nine points on three 3-pointers and three assists. Fellow freshman Julia Champagne of Brunswick contributed seven points and four rebounds.

While St. Joseph’s was making its second appearance in the NCAA tournament, Christopher Newport, in its 17th trip, is a veteran, advancing to the Final Four as recently as 2011.

Because NCAA rules dictate that a team located within 500 miles of its competition site are required to travel by ground, the Monks, who had to trek 420 miles, turned their tournament berth into an adventure.

They cut their trip in half by staying in Hartford, Connecticut, on Wednesday night.

“We’re not going to dwell on our last loss,” said McDevitt, who finished his 23rd season as the coach.

“We had a special year and we’re building something here. We have a program.”