Plainview – The 12
th ranked Queens extend their winning streak to five games after taking down the Golden Eagles of John Brown University, 78-65, Saturday afternoon at the Hutcherson Center.
Wayland Baptist (13-1, 10-1 SAC) got off to a blistering hot start in today's game after knocking down four of their first six shots to jump out to an early 9-0 lead over John Brown (7-7, 5-5 SAC). The Queens continued their torrid shooting stretch to begin the game after
Bobbie Fouquet drained the third WBU three-pointer of the quarter to make it 19-5.
Emily Sigala and Fouquet capped off the dominant opening quarter for the Queens by scoring back-to-back layups to give WBU a 23-10 lead over the Golden Eagles.
The two teams traded buckets for the first three minutes of the second quarter, but the Golden Eagles started getting good looks offensively and knocked down a few shots to force the Queens to call a timeout with the score at 32-26, WBU.
The Queens quickly pushed their lead back up to double digits after Fouquet knocked down two more three-pointers to make it 40-29 with just over two minutes until the halftime break.
Over the final two minutes of the half, the Queens had a few defensive miscues that resulted in the Golden Eagles knocking down three straight three-pointers to trim their deficit to 45-40 at the halftime intermission.
After scoring eight points in the first half,
Megan Nestor began to assert her dominance at the start of the third quarter when she scored back-to-back buckets to push the Queens lead to 49-40. After the Golden Eagles made the score 53-45, the Queens began to take the game over by going on a 10-0 run that was capped off by another dominant interior bucket from Nestor.
Wayland Baptist closed the third quarter strong and carried a 66-47 lead into the fourth quarter.
The Queens held their largest lead of the game at the beginning of the fourth quarter after North knocked down her third three-pointer of the contest to make it 69-47. The Golden Eagles wouldn't go down without a fight and trimmed the Queens lead to just 11 points with just over three minutes left in the game, but the Queens held the Golden Eagles scoreless over the final 2:55 of the game to seal the 78-65 victory and move to 10-1 in Sooner Athletic Conference play.
Head Coach
Jason Cooper was pleased with his team's performance this afternoon saying, "I'm excited about how well we are shooting the ball. Thought we did a great job today with offensive execution, very limited turnovers, and 22 assists. Made some great looks on the offensive end."
Coach Cooper continued, "I challenged the girls at halftime on their defense. I felt like in the first half, because we were scoring so much, we decided we didn't really need to play on the other end of the court. That's a dangerous game when you're playing a team that shoots the ball as well as John Brown does."
Nestor recorded her tenth double-double of the season – finishing with 21 points and 18 rebounds. Jerden finished with 17 points, including 3 for 4 from three, four assists, and two rebounds. Fouquet added 15 points while hitting 4 of 5 from three, two rebounds, and an assist in 25 minutes off the bench. North finished with 11 points, four assists, and two rebounds.
"Today, Meg played at a different level, and it was very evident. Not just because of the numbers, 21 and 18, but her presence and her dominance out on the floor was very evident. Bobbie is just on a tear coming off the bench. She's shooting the ball so well and playing with such high energy. She's such a great athlete and when she's out there playing loose and confident, she's definitely one of the top players in the conference."
The Flying Queens will play their third game in five days when travel to Goodwell, Oklahoma for a road Sooner Athletic Conference game at Oklahoma Panhandle State University on Monday, January 6
th. Tip-off is scheduled for 6:00 PM.
