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The Kentucky women?s basketball team won their third straight game by topping Austin Peay 82-56 on Tuesday, Dec. 29 in Memorial Coliseum. Junior Sara Potts recorded her second double-double of the season with a career-high tying 21 points and 11 rebounds while senior Danyelle Payne came off the bench to score a career-high 15 points.
?I thought it was a great win for us,? UK Coach Mickie DeMoss said. ?It was a good team effort. We had some people that stepped up when we needed them. I thought we played hard on both ends of the floor. We?re seeing some signs of improvement on our defense.?
It didn?t take the Cats (7-4) long to build a lead on the Lady Govs as UK shot 48.4 percent from the field in the first half and out-rebounded Austin Peay 23-14 in the opening stanza. The Cats held the Lady Govs to 32.1 percent shooting from the field and only 3-of-13 for 23.1 percent from the three-point line. UK led 41-24 at the break behind Payne?s 11 first-half points. Sophomore guard Jenny Pfeiffer went out of the game at the 8:35 mark in the first half with a bloody nose but returned in the second stanza and ended the game with 10 points.
?With Jenny Pfeiffer getting injured, Danyelle stepped up big for us, tonight,? DeMoss said. ?It was good to see Sara Potts get that three-point stroke in gear. I thought we played hard on both ends of the floor. ?
Potts found her shooting touch in the second-half, netting four of her team-high five three-pointers. The junior, who had not made a shot behind the arc since facing Xavier on Dec. 10, opened up the Cats? largest lead of the game, 61-34, with one of treys at the 12:14 mark. The Lady Govs (5-5) managed only three field goals in the final five minutes of the game, and senior Kristen Grassi provided the final 26-point margin of victory with a lay-up with only 22 seconds to play.
?Any win is important to us,? DeMoss said. ?We don?t take anybody for granted. Every win is a big win and I want these kids to be excited about every win. It?s just a matter of getting that ?win? attitude.?
Although UK?s leading scorer SeSe Helm was held to eight points and seven rebounds, forward Shambrica Jones stepped up her game and dropped in a season-high 16 points and pulled down eight rebounds. Junior Keiko Tate and freshman Angela Phillips each finished with five points. Phillips also dished out a team-high seven assists, playing all 40 minutes of the game.
?What a great game for Kentucky,? APSU first-year coach Andy Blackston said. ?They really played well. Our idea going in was to stop Helm and we did that. We didn?t expect Danyelle Payne to come in and score 15 points when she is averaging 2.0 a game. She stepped up and made some big plays as did (Shambrica) Jones. Every time I looked up Sara Potts was making a shot. She really played well. What a great environment they have set up here. The college basketball environment was really good.?
The 6,712 fans that witnessed the defeat marked the largest crowd since UK played host to nationally-ranked Tennessee on Jan. 23, 2000. Over 8,300 saw that game.
?I was just amazed (at the crowd),? DeMoss said. ?There are coaches that have coached a lifetime that have never coached in front of 6,700 fans. My hat is off to our marketing people and the way our community has responded to this program and to this team.?
The Cats controlled the boards by outrebounding the Lady Govs 46-36. UK also scored 18 points off 12 Austin Peay miscues. The Cats tied a season-low with only 10 turnovers in the game.
Austin Peay had two players reach double figures as Ashley Haynes and Gerlonda Hardin scored 18 and 14 points, respectively.
UK now leads the all-time series 5-0 vs. Austin Peay, including a 3-0 mark when playing the game in Lexington. The Cats head to the Queen City for their first game of 2004 when they face Cincinnati on Friday, Jan. 2 at the Fifth Third Arena at Shoemaker Center at 7 p.m.
