Ladyjacks Use Early Run to Power Past Morgan State, 69-42

Friday, November 16

Nacgodoches, Texas

6:30 p.m.

Stephen F. Austin

Morgan State

Morgan St.

SFA

Ladyjacks Use Early Run to Power Past Morgan State, 69-42

11/16/2018 8:08:00 PM | Women's Basketball

Box Score

By: Kevin Meyer | Assistant Director of Athletic Media Relations

NACOGDOCHES, Texas – The SFA women's basketball team used a 12-2 run in the first quarter to seize control and never relinquished the lead in a victory over Morgan State on Friday. The win improves SFA to 1-1 on the season and advances them to face Yale in their final Preseason WNIT game on Saturday afternoon. Yale defeated Niagara 67-64 earlier in the day inside William R. Johnson Coliseum to advance to Saturday's matchup of the winning squads.

"Good first win tonight, everyone got to play and almost everyone scored in what was a really even scoring effort tonight", SFA head coach Mark Kellogg said. "We did some good things, we did some others that we need to clean up, but the assist to turnover ratio was great, we forced a lot of turnovers and got some steals. We got them sped up, which was kind of the goal, and we'll clean up a little bit of the offense to be more efficient."

Riley Harvey and Marissa Banfield led the way for SFA, as Harvey notched 12 points and Banfield added 11 and four assists. SFA's pressure was too much for the Lady Bears to handle, as they turned the ball over 28 times, with 13 of those coming via steals by the SFA defense. Imani Johnson notched a great all around game, scoring nine points, hauling down five rebounds and six assists.

"I was pleased because we got the lead pretty early and then we just kept it and stopped them from making a serious run" continued Kellogg. "For the most part it all played out how you want it to, you get to distribute the minutes on a back to back and I think that's pretty important and ready to roll for what I think is a really good Yale team."

The Ladyjacks would open the game's scoring on a layup by Chanell Hayes, part of a 16-point effort by SFA in the opening frame. After the Lady Bears tied the game up at four apiece a short while later, the 'Jacks went on a 12-2 run that spanned over the next five minutes, punctuated by a pair of threes from Marissa Banfield and four points from Harvey. The 'Jacks would hold a 16-9 lead at the end of the first quarter and lead the rest of the way.

The Ladyjacks further increased the lead with a 17-8 edge in the second quarter, and really broke the game open in the third, outscoring Morgan State 22-10 in the stanza. The lead reached a game-high 31 points in the fourth quarter, thanks to 30 SFA points scored off of 28 Morgan State turnovers.

"It's part of our defensive identity to try and speed people up, see if we can play off some forced turnovers and generate some easy offense", Kellogg added. "They were a bit under-manned right now, so we were able to get them a little tired, keep speeding them up and run more bodies at them."

SFA connected on 25-62 (40.3 percent) of its field goals in the contest and was 7-29 (24.1) percent from beyond the arc. Morgan State hit 15-41 (36.6 percent) of attempts from the field and 2-14 (14.3 percent) from three-point territory. A total of eleven Ladyjacks scored in the contest.

SFA will now face the Bulldogs (2-1) on Saturday following the 2:00 p.m matchup between Morgan State and Niagara, the two losing teams of Saturday's action.

-SFA-