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Southern Miss Gets First Win, Holds Off UL-Monroe, 57-55
Monroe, La. - Senior forward Dana Jones scored a career 20 points, leading the Southern Miss Lady Eagles to a 57-55 victory over Louisiana-Monroe, Sunday afternoon. Southern Miss evened its record at 1-1, while UL-Monroe dropped to 0-1.
Lana Lewis, Allison Story and Jessica Woods added eight points, each, while Sonja Brown had 10 blocked shots. Story and Jones also pulled down eight boards each. D'Wayna Freeman led UL-Monroe with 12 points.
"We got a little tentative at the end again," Head Coach Rick Reeves said. "I think we learned a lesson at Hampton that things don't always go your way on the road. You can't play not to lose, you still have to play to win. We got tentative again, with our offense. We're going to have to work a little harder in practice on some things."
UL-Monroe jumped out to an early 4-0 lead, but the Lady Eagles then scored six unanswered points to take a two-point lead, 6-4. Over the next four minutes, ULM outscored Southern Miss 10-3, taking a 14-9 lead at the 12:36 mark in the half. The Golden Eagles battled back, outscoring ULM 14-8 over a five minute span to take the lead, 23-21. Southern Miss held on, taking a 33-27 lead into the half.
Southern Miss pushed its lead to 11 points in the second half, 45-34, at the 14:11 mark. ULM began to chip away at the lead and outscored Southern Miss 11-3 over six minutes, cutting the lead to four points, 48-44, at the 7:49 mark. Over a 4:29, ULM outscored the Lady Eagles 8-2 to tie the game at 52-52. On Southern Miss' next possession, Jones completed a three-point play to give the Eagles the lead for good. Woods added an insurance basket as the shot clock expired to give Southern Miss a four-point advantage.
Southern Miss finished the game shooting 42.3 percent from the field, but connected on only 45 percent from the line. Both team combined for 47 turnovers. ULM had 15 steals.
Southern Miss begins a five game homestand, hosting UCF, Nov. 27, at 4:30 p.m.
