MACOMB, Ill. - The Northern Illinois University women's basketball team got out to a fast start against the Western Illinois Leathernecks Sunday afternoon at Western Hall, but the Huskies could not keep pace with Western Illinois' shooting from the field in a 95-62 loss.
"There's a lot on the stat sheet that we're not going to be happy with," said head coach
Lisa Carlsen after the game. "At the end of the day, Western Illinois played harder than we did and they got comfortable and we got tight. That's never a good combination."
Western Illinois (2-1) shot 53.6 percent from the field and was 9-for-16 from the three-point line. NIU was held to 36.1 percent from the field and 21.9 percent from long distance. Senior guard
Jayden Marable (Bolingbrook, Ill./Bolingbrook) led the Huskies with 16 points and three assists. Freshman
Shannon Blacher (Burr Ridge, Ill./Montini Catholic) had 10 points and three rebounds off the bench, her first 10 points of her career.
Kortney Drake (Wilton, Iowa/Kirkwood CC) scored nine points in her first career start.
NIU (0-2) opened the game on a 7-0 run, getting baskets from Marable and
Brooke Stonebraker (Versailles, Ohio/Versailles) as well as a Drake three, in the first two minutes. Western Illinois responded with an 11-2 run over 5:54, taking an 11-9 lead on a pair of Allie Meadows free throws. Marable put NIU back in front with five straight points, putting in a layup with 0:58 left in the first to make the score 14-11. The Leathernecks scored the final four points of the quarter on layups from Mallory McDermott and Anna Deets to take a 15-14 advantage.
Those four points sparked a 12-0 Leathernecks run, capped by six straight points from Raegan McCowan, that extended the Western Illinois lead to 23-14 with 7:40 to go until halftime. The Huskies got as close as eight points with 2:17 remaining when a pair of
Sidney McCrea (Cedar Rapids, Iowa/Prairie) free throws made the score 38-30. The Leathernecks scored the final five points of the half to go up 43-30 at the break.
NIU chipped away at Western Illinois' lead to start the third quarter. A
Tara Stauffacher (Columbus, Wis./Wisconsin) three-point play and a Drake three helped get the Huskies within nine, 49-40, at the 6:43 mark. However the Leathernecks shot 64 percent from the field in the quarter to take a 73-50 lead, closing the quarter on a 10-2 run.
"We didn't score enough points or shoot the ball well enough to win," Carlsen said. "We also didn't get a lot of second chance opportunities. We didn't get enough paint and post touches to open things up. We did get good looks, but I don't think we got as good of looks as we needed."
McCowan led all scorers with 23 points, adding seven rebounds and five assists. Deets had 21 points and seven rebounds. Western Illinois held a 43-29 rebounding edge and scored 48 points in the paint.
The Huskies wrap up their season-opening three-game road swing on Thursday, Nov. 16 at Southern Indiana. Tip-off is at 7 p.m. CT.
—NIU—
