TCU Rolls Past Southern Miss, 72-37
2/8/2002 12:00:00 AM | Women's Basketball
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TCU Rolls Past Southern Miss, 72-37
No. 24 ranked TCU took advantage of 29 Southern Miss turnovers en route to a 72-37 victory Friday night in Daniel-Meyer Coliseum. Southern Miss dropped to 10-13 and 3-7 in Conference USA, while TCU improved to 18-4 and a league-best 8-1.
La'Tasha Sumerall was the only Golden Eagle to score in double figures with 10 points, all the second half. Sandora Irvin led TCU with a game-high 19 points and Kati Safaritova scored 14.
"I thought we started the game with very good defense," Head Coach Rick Reeves said. "We held them to 29 points in the first half and eight of those points were break-aways where we didn't get back. We have got to so much more mentally tough than we are right now."
Southern Miss scored the first two points of the game and actually led 5-4, before TCU went on a 12-0 run to take a 16-5 lead at the 9:39 mark in the half and never look back. The Horned Frogs led by as many as 15, 19-14, right before the half. TCU led at the half 29-16.
"We have to learn to be physical with teams and we're not," Reeves said. "We want to be a race-horse type team, we want to get up and down the floor. Since we have gotten in conference play, its become very physical. We have to get ready for a Houston team that will play all 94 feet."
TCU opened the second half with a 10-2 run, building its lead to 21, 39-18, three minutes into the half. Southern Miss scored only four points, all from the free throw line, in the first 5:17 to start the half. Sumerall scored 10 straight points, getting the TCU lead below 20 points with 10:49 remaining.
The Horned Frogs finished the game with 17 steals, nine blocked shots and outrebounding Southern Miss 46-32. TCU scored 33 points off Southern Miss' 29 turnovers. The Golden Eagles shot 28.3 percent for the game.
Southern Miss returns to action Feb. 10 at Houston, before returning home for its last three games at home. Tipoff is 2 p.m.