Alabama
Northwestern State
Women's Basketball Beats Northwestern State, 61-56
12/6/2009 12:00:00 AM | Women's Basketball
Dec. 6, 2009
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TUSCALOOSA, Ala. - The Alabama women's basketball team (5-4) used a 13-2 run late in the second half to pull away from Northwestern State (4-4) and win 61-56 in a hotly contested game at Coleman Coliseum. The second half featured five ties and six lead changes, but a layup by senior Dedrea Magee with 6:54 remaining gave the Crimson Tide a 48-46 lead that it would not relinquish.
"At the end of the game we did some good things," head coach Wendell Hudson said. "There was a stretch there where we talked to the team about trusting themselves and trusting each other. There was a stretch where we built a nine point lead and trusted each other."
After the 13-2 spurt, Alabama led 57-48, but the Lady Demons made one last push, closing the gap to three points at 59-56. Junior LaToya King helped put the game away though with two clutch free throws that put the Tide up 61-56 with 0:35 seconds left, which ended up being the deciding margin.
Alabama's 40 minutes of full-court pressure defense forced Northwestern State to commit 25 turnovers that led to 16 points. The Tide came away with 13 steals led by King with a game-high three. The Tide got solid production from its bench players who scored 22 points compared to nine bench points for the Lady Demons.
Magee led Alabama with 19 points on 8-of-12 shooting. Junior Tierney Jenkins narrowly missed a double-double with eight points and nine rebounds. Junior Alyson Butler added nine points off the bench on 4-of-5 shooting, which included making one of the Tide's two three pointers.
"I think it was really the flow of the game (that allowed me to score) because of the way they were playing defensively," Magee said. "The guards were sagging off a bit. I just go out and try to lead the team, play hard and get everybody involved."
Alabama shot 34.4 percent (21-of-61) from the field for the game, while Northwestern State made 35.7 percent (20-of-56) of its field goal attempts. The Tide got to the foul line 29 times, converting 17, and the Lady Demons hit 11-of-16 from the charity stripe.
"We're getting some good shots," Hudson said. "We're running things to get shots and get the ball in the area that we would like to be able to shoot the ball from. That's all you can do. You can't talk a lot about it, you can't preach about it because the worth thing that can happen to shooters is worrying about shooting the basketball."
Butler swished a pull-up jumper as the first half buzzer sounded to give Alabama a 32-29 lead entering the break. The Tide jumped out to an 8-2 lead to start the game but Northwestern State battled back to take the lead 10-9. The Lady Demons maintained a small lead until Jenkins sank two free throws to put the Tide back on top at 17-16 with 6:50 left.
Magee led Alabama with 12 point before intermission, while Butler and King gave the Tide a spark off the bench, scoring Alabama's final nine points of the half.
Brooke Shepherd and Sherrion Thomas scored 14 points each to lead Northwestern State. Thomas also grabbed a team-high eight rebounds.
Alabama travels to Orlando, Fla. to take on UCF in its next contest on Dec. 14. Tip-off is scheduled for 6:00 p.m. (CST).
