BATON ROUGE, La. -- Texas A&M is one of the best defensive women's basketball teams in the country. The Aggies are athletic, they press, they are physical, they make it difficult for teams to get open shots.

That stout defense is why the Aggies advanced to the Elite Eight last year and is a reason they are ranked No. 11 and considered a legitimate Final Four contender.

It is hard to score against them and as Pitt found out yesterday, it is darn near impossible without the starting point guard.

Pitt also plays great defense, so the Aggies and Panthers staged an old-fashioned defensive slugfest in the State Farm Tip-Off Classic before a crowd of 7,954 at LSU's Pete Maravich Assembly Center.

The Panthers, who played the final 35 minutes without starting point guard Jania Sims because of a knee injury, couldn't find enough points to win the game and dropped a 56-50 decision to the Aggies.

"I feel like we really struggled all night and really both teams struggled all night," Pitt coach Agnus Berenato said. "It wasn't a pretty game of basketball but somebody was going to win it and somebody was going to lose it. But it is just one game, it is a game of basketball and I am a little more concerned right now about the loss of our point guard, Jania Sims, and I just want to give a shout out to Xenia Stewart who stepped in and played the point.

"I think that's what is special about Pitt, everybody had to adjust a position here and there. Xenia had a tremendous responsibility on her against one of the best defensive teams in the nation. Give them credit, Texas A&M really got after it."

Texas A&M coach Gary Blair acknowledged that it isn't always fun to watch his team play because they work so hard on defense and fans generally like to see offense.

But he was quick to defend the Aggies' style. In his mind, two teams playing great defense against each other is not ugly, it is a thing of beauty.

"Sometimes when you can win and not be at your best, you've got to take it and feel good about yourself," Blair said. "When they lost their point guard it really affected them. Their defense was a whole lot better than what we had seen on film. Both of us, this early in the season, our offense was going to struggle, particularly when both of us were sort of patchwork at the point guard position. It is the most important position on the team.

"Ugly though? When is defense called ugly? Back when my Cowboys used to play the 'Doomsday Defense' it was pretty good. A long time ago when the Raiders were good, the defense was pretty good. What is wrong with that? I was at Arkansas when Nolan Richardson was doing his '40 minutes of hell', that defense was pretty good. The game does not have to be only about jump shots."

Sims went down with the score tied, 7-7, and Stewart, a senior, had to step in and finish the game at point guard. She said she had not played the position since she was a freshman.

Pitt had only three assists but had 22 turnovers.

Pitt's leading scorer, senior Shavonte Zellous, was being harassed the entire game by Texas A&M defensive whiz Danielle Gant. Zellous finished with a game-high 23 points but she scored 14 of those points from the free-throw line and she made only 3 of 16 shots.

Despite the offensive struggles, Pitt led 25-23 at the half and 35-34 with 10:27 to play in the game but the Aggies used a 9-2 run over the next three minutes to pull away. They maintained at least a six-point cushion the rest of the way.

"Our offense was kind of shaky because of their defense," Zellous said. "Like coach [Berenato] said, coach Blair has worked with [Texas A&M] on defense, so there was a lot of pressure on us. I don't think we used our pressure relieves. We have to go in on Tuesday and work out the things that we messed up today."

Texas A&M got a boost off the bench from guard Sydney Colson, who had ACL surgery in July and was only supposed to play limited action. But Colson played 22 minutes and had 12 points, including two key 3-pointers.