Sharon Blade made six of her team-high 13 points in the opening four minutes, but Creighton survived the early Illinois State spurt to beat the Redbirds 77-52 in Missouri Valley Conference womens basketball Sunday at the Civic Auditorium.
The Birds ran their offense to perfection in the opening minutes, taking a 12-6 lead by hitting six of their first seven field goal attempts. The only miss was rebounded by
Kellie Johnson, who got a put-back basket. Blade had three buckets,
Nadia Peruch two and Johnson one in the opening flurry.
Creighton, 13-8 overall, 7-5 in the Valley, entered the game with a string of 10 straight free throws made and extended that to 24 in a row before missing. The Jays made 14 of 15 free throws while only letting ISU go to the line a total of eight times for the game. Christy Neneman led the Jays with 14 points as CU extended its home record against Illinois State to 10-0 in the series.
But ISU, 4-18 overall, 2-11 in the Valley, cooled off--just one field goal in its next 12 attempts-- and Creighton got goingwith a 10-2 flurry including six points by Neneman who led all players with 14 points, to take their first lead at 16-14 at the 12-minute mark. The Jays kept going with 11 more points in the run to take a 27-14 lead. A physical, attacking, double-teaming press helped the Jays take command. Despite plenty of contact, the Birds didnt shoot their first free throw until 4:53 left in the half.
The Bluejay bench scored a rare feat by out-pointing the Redbird subs. CU got 35 points to ISUs 20 bench points. Its only the third time in 13 league games ISUs bench was out-scored. The Jays got 10 points each from starters Angela Timmons and Kim Hover.
Redbird coach
Jenny Yopp was impressed with Creightons depth.
Creighton has a very athletic basketball team with a lot of depth, said Yopp, whose team forced just 12 turnovers for the game. We didnt handle them defensively and didnt handle the ball well enough against the press.
Krissie Spanheimers two free throws with 3.6 seconds left put Creighton up 39-29 at the intermission. After that initial spurt, ISU made just 7 of its last 25 attempts in the half. Creighton made all 11 free throws and ISU was 2 of 3 from the line.
Illinois State struggled to get its offense going in the second half as Creighton slowly built on its lead. ISU scored just 23 second-half points and were out-shot 61.5 to 36 percent from the field in the second half.
Free throws were a problem on the Redbirds Drake-Creighton trip. ISU shot just 15 free throws on the road trip despite averaging 22 attempts per game in their first 20 games of the season.
A shoulder injury kept ISUs No. 2 scorer,
Jaci McCormack, out of the game. McCormack hurt her shoulder in Fridays loss at Drake.
Not having our best ballhandler, Jaci McCormack, against the best press weve seen all season hurt us, said Yopp.
The Redbirds return to Redbird Arena for a three-game homestand beginning at 7 p.m Friday against Indiana State.
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