Southern Miss
UAB
Women's Basketball Team Downs UAB, 71-52
2/26/2009 12:00:00 AM | Women's Basketball
Feb. 26, 2009
HATTIESBURG, Miss. - Junior Stephanie Helgeson matched her career-high of 26 points in leading Southern Miss past UAB, 71-52, Thursday night in Conference USA action.
Southern Miss (18-10, 11-4) shot 56.7 percent in the second half, while putting up 42 points.
Kendra Reed notched double digit scoring with 15 points. Pauline Love hauled down a game-high 11 rebounds.
UAB's Britney Jones scored a team-high 25 points for the Blazers and Amanda Peterson added 11 points.
"I thought we came out a little slow, but we picked it up the second half," Coach Joye Lee-McNelis said. "We were able to get our fast break going and we controlled the boards and I believe that was the difference tonight."
Both team struggled early in the first half as Southern Miss shot 38.5 percent from the field and UAB shot 29.6 percent.
UAB (10-18, 5-10) scored first points of the game, then, the Lady Eagles went on a 9-0 run, taking a 9-4 lead. UAB responded with back-to-back threes by Jones and Peterson to regain the lead at 10-9. Southern Miss retook the lead on a jumper by Love and from there continued to build on its lead until the Golden Eagles led by 12 points, 29-17, with 3:25 remaining before the half. UAB cut the lead to single digits, 29-20, on a three-point by Jones and that remained the halftime score.
"You have to applaud Stephanie's performance tonight," said McNelis. "She has worked very hard in practice. We've been beating the stew out of them with pads."
UAB cut the lead to six, 33-29, to start the second half, but Southern Miss quickly scored six unanswered points, pushing the lead to 12, 35-23. Over the next four minutes, the Blazers outscored Southern Miss, 12-4, to get within six points again, 39-33, with 13:29 remaining. From there, Southern Miss outscored UAB, 14-2, over five minutes to take a 53-35 lead. For the remainder of the game, UAB could get no closer than 14 points.
Helgeson was one rebound shy of her seventh double-double with nine rebounds.
"We feel really good right now," Helgeson said. "We just have to play hard against Memphis and get a win. We are playing with a lot of confidence and a lot of momentum. We love playing at home and protecting our floor."
Southern Miss out rebounded the Blazers, 44-33, and finished the game shooting 48.2 percent. The Lady Eagles also had only 15 turnovers in the game.
Reed is just two points shy of passing Coach Joye Lee-McNelis on the all-time scoring list.
Southern Miss concludes its regular season, hosting Memphis Saturday, at 5 p.m. The three seniors, Andrea Barber, Amber Eugene and Kendra Reed, will be honored in a post-game ceremony.
