DeKALB, IL – The Northern Illinois University women's basketball team shot 46.5 percent from the field Saturday night and had five players score in double figures as the Huskies ran away with a 104-43 win over the Ripon College Red Hawks at the NIU Convocation Center in exhibition play.
 
"If we get threes and get to the paint and the foul line, that's how we need to work offensively," said head coach Lisa Carlsen. "Even though we maybe didn't shoot as well as I would have liked, we got good looks from the three-point line and I feel good about that. We also were better defensively in the second half and did a good job taking care of the basketball."
 
Junior guard Laura Nickel (Marshall, Wis./Marshall HS) led all scorers with 15 points, adding five assists and four rebounds. Jayden Marable (Bolingbrook, Ill./Bolingbrook) had 14 points and a game-high seven assists. Grace Hunter (Monroeville, Ind./Bellmont) added 13 points as Brooke Stonebraker (Versailles, Ohio/Versailles), Kortney Drake (Wilton, Iowa/Kirkwood CC) and Moriah Prewitt (Urbandale, Iowa/Des Moines Christian) each scored 12. Drake also added six assists and six rebounds.
 
NIU led Ripon 14-11 with 1:38 to go in the first quarter when a pair of Prewitt free throws sparked a quick 9-1 run that put the Huskies up 23-12. A Hunter three with five seconds left in the opening quarter punctuated the run. After shooting 35 percent from the field in the first quarter, NIU shot 50 percent in the second to take a 46-28 halftime lead. Ripon closed to within eight points midway through the quarter before the Huskies went on an 8-0 run, capped by five straight points from Drake, to take a 41-25 lead with 2:13 to go in the half.
 
The Huskies opened the third quarter outscoring the Red Hawks 19-1 over the first 5:34 to go ahead 65-29. NIU made seven of its first 10 shots from the field in the third as Marable and Stonebraker combined for 11 of the first 19 points. NIU held Ripon without a field goal for the first 6:32 of the quarter before Breanna Miller made a three. The Huskies held Ripon to 3-for-16 from the field in the quarter while shooting 57.9 percent themselves to take a 76-36 lead. NIU held the Red Hawks to just one made field goal in the fourth to cap the 104-43 victory.
 
All 10 Huskies that played Saturday night scored and had at least two rebounds. The Huskies had 24 assists on 33 made baskets with just seven turnovers. NIU also outrebounded Ripon 59-38 and held the Red Hawks to 3-for-15 from the three-point line. The Huskies scored 24 points off of 24 Ripon turnovers.
 
"I think we're going to be a team that can play deep so that we can continue to play with this kind of pace," Carlsen said. "I saw good things from everybody. I really liked some things I saw from our freshmen, which is good. I feel good about playing any 10. It's not like there's a big gap between what our 'starters' can do and then what our bench can do."
 
The Huskies open the regular season on Thursday, Nov. 9 at Arkansas State in the MAC-Sun Belt Challenge. Tipoff from Jonesboro, Ark. is at 11 a.m. CT.
 
--NIU--