HAWKINS – Trailing by one at halftime, Wayland Baptist erupted in the second half as the No. 8 Flying Queens denied Jarvis Christian's upset bid here Thursday night, 83-70.
"They were scrappy and super athletic and played with a lot of energy," WBU coach
Jason Cooper said. "It took us a while to get in sync on offense. Once we finally started running our offense, setting screens and helping each other, we pulled away."
Wayland (3-0) found itself down 33-32 at intermission, having scored just five second-quarter points against the Bulldogs who were playing their season-opener.
"I felt like we played defense 16 of the 20 minutes in the first half," Cooper said. "Plus we missed a lot of easy shots. If we make half of those we're feeling totally different about ourselves."
The Flying Queens put up 31 points in the third period and 20 more in the fourth for an impressive 51-point second half.
"Give them credit for playing scrappy, hard defense. It riled us in the first quarter," Cooper said. "But once we started working together everything started clicking.
"We pulled away two or three times then they would hit some kind of crazy shot and get on a run themselves."
Kaylee Edgemon scored a team-high 22 points for the second straight game plus added 10 rebounds for the first double-double of the season for the NAIA All-American.
Jenna Cooper added 18 points and nine boards to just miss her own double-double.
Kaitlyn Edgemon chipped in 13 points while
Angel Hayden added 11.
The Flying Queens shot 46 percent (28-of-61) from the field, including 27 percent (4-of-15) from 3-point range. Wayland hit 3-of-8 3s in the first period before moving more to an inside attack and going 1-for-7 the final three periods. Wayland hit 23-of-32 (72 percent) from the free-throw line.
Jarvis got 22 points and four 3s from Makaila Cheatem and 19 points and a dozen boards from Brianna Page. The Bulldogs hit 8-of-25 from long range.
The Flying Queens travel to Alexandria, La., from here to take on LSU-Alexandria (0-2) at 1 p.m. Saturday. The Generals have lost their first two games to Philander Smith, 75-67, and Tougaloo, 74-64.
