Kingsville - Behind a huge second quarter and domination on the glass, the Texas A&M-Kingsville women's basketball team earned its first win of the season with a 70-41 takedown of the Cameron Aggies.
The first game after the calendar turn gave the Javelinas their first win as three different players, led by sophomore guard
Addisyn Parker, scored in double figures. Kingsville crushed the glass, notching 43 rebounds compared to the Aggies' 23, on the way to out-scoring the road team by 29 through the last three quarters.
"It was a tremendous effort by everybody," Head Coach
Michael Madrid said. "You look at where we scored each quarter, we were pretty consistent over four quarters in terms of the way that we scored. I think this may be the first game all year, we had more assists than turnovers. We just did a tremendous job of sharing the basketball."
The game started as a back-and-forth affair, with the teams knotted at 16 through the first 10 minutes. TAMUK then exploded into the second quarter, shooting 10-of-15 in the frame while holding the Aggies to just 1-of-12 (six points), opening up a 15-point halftime lead. The frame included a 13-1 run that saw five different Javelinas record a made field goal.
"I thought to start the game, we lost a little bit of concentration and kind of let them get loose a bit," Madrid said. "Then we just sort of decided after that quarter hey let's concentrate, let's get in a stance, let's kind of take people away, then we just continue to plug away offensively."
From there, Kingsville ran away with the ball game, adding to its lead in the second half, where it held Cameron to just 7-of-26 shooting from the field. The team excelled on the offensive end as well, as Parker scored a team-high 13 points on 5-of-9 shooting, while sophomore forward
Thalia Daniels added 12 points, seven rebounds, four assists, and two steals. Freshman guard Jadeyn Perez had a phenomenal day as well, showing out in her first collegiate start. Though she shot just 4-of-11 from the field, she totalled 11 points, six rebounds, and two assists (all single-game career highs).
"My gameplan was just to play to my strengths," Perez said. "I know that I have a good drive on me, so I decided to try to use it against players that had slower feet. And overall, I just wanted to share the ball and try to get good ball movement, so that way we could really start off the year with a W."
Freshman guard
Landri Richey added a career high eight points off the bench, redshirt junior guard
Kaycee Groves notched eight points, three rebounds, three assists, and two steals, and redshirt freshman forward
Caitlyn Benally came off the pine to put up seven points and six rebounds. It was a team effort for the Javelinas, who reached their highest single-game team scoring total in regulation while turning the ball over just 15 times (tied for second fewest this season).
Kingsville will now look ahead to a Sunday matinee against the Eagles from Oklahoma Christian, in a 1:00 p.m. tipoff back in the SPEC.
