Lady Bengals win tenth straight with Friday night victory
The LSU Eunice women's basketball team pushed its winning streak into double digits on Friday night, pulling away from visiting Patrick Henry Community College for an 81-37 victory.
The win moves the Lady Bengals (16-1) to 10-straight wins, spanning back to November 22, and also marks the 10th time this season that they have held opponents to 50 points or fewer – tying the program record set by the 2007-2008 squad.
On Friday night, LSU Eunice overcame a speedy Patrick Henry (7-8) team en route to the big win, with all 12 Lady Bengals registered points in the scoring column as LSU Eunice's pressure defense and up-tempo offense took a toll on Patrick Henry's eight-player roster.
"It's always good when you can have a balanced scoring attack and everyone can contribute not just on the defensive end, but on the offensive end as well," head coach Yolanda Moore said.
"We use our defense to create our offense. We are very much a running team and it starts with our defense," sophomore Baylie Lee added.
"They were fast. They had a couple of good guards. It was tough for us to keep them out of the middle and we had to make some adjustments. They really challenged us from a hustle perspective, but overall we did a good job of answering their challenge." Moore added about a Patrick Henry team similar in many ways to upcoming Miss-Lou Conference opponents.
The Lady Bengals grew the lead throughout the game, taking a 26-point lead into the halftime break before the score climbed to its' 44-point final margin.
Overall, LSU Eunice finished the night shooting 52 percent (34-of-65) from the floor, but just 39 percent (11-28) from the free throw stripe and 15 percent (2-13) from three point range.
Lee led all scorers with 12 points, all coming in the first half, tallying three rebounds and a steal.
Four players each notched 10 points, as sophomore Taylor Maricle added seven rebounds and five steals, sophomore Meghan Cross added 10 rebounds and a steal, sophomore Brooke Richard added four assists, two rebounds and a steal and freshman Ashlyn Wiemann added three rebounds, a steal and an assist.
Freshman Meghan Knight came off the bench to notch seven second half points while grabbing five rebounds, while four Lady Bengals each finished with four points – Kelsey Thibodeaux, Victoria Fontenot, Misha Mouton and Taylor Holzmeier.
Thibodeaux finished with three rebounds, an assist and a block to go along with her points, Fontenot added two rebounds, two steals and an assist, Mouton passed out six rebounds and had five assists and Holzmeier grabbed five rebounds.
Freshman McKayla Willie and sophomore Reagan Maricle each tallied three points to round out the Lady Bengal scoring, with Maricle passing out a game-high seven assists.
Katherine Kopp finished with a team-high eight points for Patrick Henry, who also saw Khadijah Wilson and Destiny Jackson each finish with seven points in the loss.
LSU Eunice and Patrick Henry square off again tomorrow afternoon with 2 p.m. tipoff. Tomorrow's game can be seen on Bengal All-Access and heard on KVPI 92.5 FM.
