Box Score FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. – The No. 20 Nova Southeastern University women's basketball team rebounded on Saturday by sending No. 9 Florida Tech to their second straight loss, tying the Panthers for second place in the Sunshine State Conference standings with a 73-52 victory at the NSU Arena.
The Sharks (13-4, 5-2 SSC) led by five points at the half, 36-31, but scored the first six after the break for the game's first double-digit lead (42-31, 17:40).
Danielle Robinson (Sr., Fort Lauderdale, Fla.) had back-to-back breakaway layups to start the spurt, and her free throw at 14:15 made it a 12-point NSU lead. FIT then reeled off seven straight to cut it to five, making it 45-40 in favor of the Sharks (13:13).
From that point until 6:03, the Shark defense buckled down and held FIT to two just free throws and 0-13 shooting. All told, NSU scored 17 of 19 points to extended the lead to 62-42. The Panthers didn't have a field goal for 8:23 of game time, and the Sharks led by at least 15 points the rest of the way.
In that 17-2 run, NSU made their first seven shots and were 8-of-9 in total. Five of their made shots came in the point, two each for
Jasmine Wilkins (R-Sr., Miami) and
Kayla Wright (So., Lauderhill, Fla.). The Sharks had a 42-17 overall advantage on points in the paint, with those two post players combining for 30 points on 13-of-19 shooting.
Wilkins led all scorers with 17 (7-of-11) and also had seven rebounds.
Jessica Valley (R-Jr., Lafayette, Ind.) had her second double-double at NSU with 14 points (6-of-9, and 2-of-3 on 3-pointers) and a game-high 10 rebounds, while Robinson also had 14 while adding seven boards and five assists. Wright went 6-of-8 off the bench for 13 points, nine in the first half, along with six rebounds.
"Our team has a lot of character, and our staff was confident we would bounce back strong today," said head coach LeAnn Freeland. "We were proud of the effort today against a very good team. Going in, we knew it was going to take a team effort to defend three of the best guards in the league, and we executed the game plan well."
The Sharks was over 50 percent in each half (54.2 and 51.7 percent) for 52.8 percent total, and held the league's best offense to 25.7 percent shooting (19-of-74). The Panthers were nearly 30 points below their season average (81.5 to their 52 on Saturday). They also came in as the conference leaders in 3-pointers made (7.9) and percentage (37.5), but only went 4-of-22 from behind the arc (18.2 percent).
The SSC's top scorer at 20.3 points per game, Kayk Wilson, totaled just 10, going 3-of-14 from the field and 1-of-8 from '3'. Morgan Steinert led the Panthers with 12 points, with no one else in double digits.
The Sharks and Panthers, both at 5-2 in-conference, now trail 6-1 Rollins by one game. Rollins defeated Tampa to make the Spartans 4-3, while Eckerd dropped their Saturday decision to Barry to go to 5-3.
