MENOMONIE, Wis. – The Gustavus women’s basketball team used a 42.3 percent shooting mark from the field and a season-high 21 free throws made to earn its 10th win of the season at the University of Wisconsin-Stout, Tuesday evening.
With the 69-58 victory, the Gusties remain undefeated and move to 10-0 overall on the season.
Mikayla Miller (Jr., Goodhue, Minn.) and Miranda Rice (Jr., Forest Lake, Minn.) led the Gusties, combining for 39 points and a mark of 12-13 at the free throw line. Miller posted a team-best 23 points while Rice led Gustavus with eight rebounds, was perfect from the free throw line for the second time this season, and added 16 points.
A hot start gave the Gusties a 9-0 lead to begin the first quarter. Gustavus held the lead over the Blue Devils throughout the first half of play, taking a 29-23 lead into the locker room. The Gusties shot 11-29 from the field and established their largest first half lead of 10 points over UW-Stout after a three-pointer from Kelsey Carpenter (Sr., St. Peter, Minn.) at the 5:15 mark of the second quarter. Carpenter was 2-2 from beyond the arc in the first half. The Black and Gold have led after one half of play in each matchup this season.
UW-Stout posted a slight push back to start the second half, outscoring the Gusties by a mark of 17-14 and cutting the Gustavus lead to 43-40 through three quarters of play.
“We had to just battle, sometimes you have to grind it out and that’s what we did tonight,” said Head Coach Laurie Kelly. “It wasn’t our best basketball, but we got stops when we needed to and when we got to the line, we finished.”
Despite being out-rebounded for the first time this season, the Gusties didn’t allow a Blue Devil comeback and retained the lead for the entire game. After shooting 37.9 percent from the field in the first half, the Gusties stepped up in the second half as they shot nearly 50 percent in the final two frames of play – going 11-23 from the field.
“I thought that the fourth quarter was good for us,” Kelly commented. “We went into the third quarter with only a three-point lead and at that point, it was a battle. We really dug down and turned on our defense, which allowed us to then get some easy scores on offense.”
Around 30 seconds into the fourth, a layup by UW-Stout tied the game at 43 a piece. From then out the Gusties were able to run away, eventually posting its largest lead of the game, 69-58 with under a minute remaining in the game as Brooke Lemke (So., Delano, Minn.) nailed went two-for-two at the line to close out the game.
“There were definitely some areas in which we weren’t ourselves, but when you’re on the road, sometimes you just have to dig down and get a stop sometimes. It is a great way to end before Christmas break and finals. It has been a great start and were going to try to enjoy this,” said Kelly.
Gustavus has a couple weeks off before returning to action Dec. 29. The Gusties face another Wisconsin Intercollegiate Athletic Conference opponent in the University of Wisconsin-River Falls at Karges Center in River Falls, Wis.