Ben Salama
Junior guard Miah Spencer goes up for the block against a Wildcat player in the first half of the basketball game. Spencer finished with game with 2 points on 1 for 2 shooting in 9 minutes before leaving the game with a thumb injury. The woman’s basketball team won convincingly against the Davidson Wildcats 58-42 on November 22nd, 2015 at Broughton High School.
The NC State women’s basketball team earned a split in the Cancun Challenge in Cancun, Mexico, Thursday and Friday, falling to Seton Hall 58-55 Thursday and defeating the University of Alabama at Birmingham 67-56 Friday to finish third in the tournament.
The Wolfpack (6-1) got dominated on the boards against the Pirates (7-0) but bounced back with a solid win against the Blazers (2-4) that saw the team turn the ball over a season low eight times.
Miah Spencer, junior guard, didn’t miss a beat following a hand injury suffered against Davidson last Sunday finished with 13 points and five rebounds in the first game and nine points and a career-high 11 rebounds in the second game.
Dominique Wilson, junior guard, was successful putting up seven points in the first game and 16 in the second. Jennifer Mathurin, junior forward, continued her good start to the season, putting up a solid showing with 19 total points over the two games, eight against Seton Hall and 11 against UAB. Ashley Williams, junior guard, had 11 points and Carlee Schumacher, senior center, notched 10 against Seton Hall.
The Wolfpack struggled from the field in both games, shooting 34 percent against Seton Hall and 37 percent against UAB. The team was outrebounded 56-39 against Seton Hall, including giving up 22 offensive rebounds; it was better off the glass against UAB, outrebounding the Blazers 45-40.
The first game against Seton Hall was a case of close but no cigar for the Wolfpack.
State trailed by a point at halftime, with the Pirates up 27-26. Had State taken better care of the ball, the team might have found itself ahead at halftime, but it turned the ball over 13 times in the first half.
Williams did much of her damage in the first half, hitting three of four three-point shots she attempted in the half for a whopping 75 percent from beyond the arc. Despite the aforementioned close calls and a few more, the Wolfpack couldn’t take the lead in the second half but did get within one point three times in the third quarter.
The Wolfpack bounced back with the UAB win. The team took better care of the ball in this one, and it was a big factor in the win, as the eight turnovers committed was the team’s fewest this season. Spencer, Mathurin and Wilson led the Pack with big games, but head coach Wes Moore also received good performance from his bench, as players who were not among his starting five combined for 24 points, compared to 13 bench points for UAB.
The Wolfpack controlled this game from start to finish, as after the first quarter its smallest lead was 10 points. While the team did not have a stellar shooting percentage for the game, it did shoot fairly well in the first half, knocking down 40 percent from the field to take control of the game. The largest lead of the game for the Pack was 20 points, which it hit twice in the fourth quarter.
The team will head to Lincoln, Nebraska, on Thursday to take on the Cornhuskers in the ACC Big 10 Challenge.