Boone, Obi Lead No. 16 Kentucky Past Morgan State
Asia Boone scored a season-high 21 points and Jordan Obi added 17 as the 16th-ranked Kentucky women’s basketball team cruised past Morgan State 101-39 on Friday in the Discover Puerto Rico Classic in San Juan.
Teonni Key had 16 points and Kaelyn Carroll had a career-high 15 for the Cats. Clara Strack had 13 points in just 16 minutes of action.
Kentucky (8-1) used a 20-0 run to break the game open late in the first quarter. UK forced 22 turnovers and scored 31 points off of those miscues. Kentucky turned the ball over only four times and Morgan State did not score off of those turnovers.
Morgan State got the first point of the game before Strack made a layup to give Kentucky its first lead. MSU took the lead back but Key scored and UK led 4-3. The lead would continue to go back and forth until the Cats got a basket from Obi and three free throws from Amelia Hassett to give UK a 11-7 lead.
The scoring run continued with an Obi basket, a Strack three-point play, a three from Boone, two Key free throws and a Carroll three. The 18-0 run closed out the first quarter with UK leading 24-7.
The run continued in the second quarter when Obi scored to make it 26-7. In total, it was a 20-0 run for the Cats. After a Lady Bears’ bucket, UK got a Tonie Morgan layup, a Strack basket and a Josie Gilvin layup to take a 32-9 lead. Morgan State hit two free throws before Obi scored back-to-back buckets, extending the lead to 36-11.
After the Lady Bears hit a three, Carroll hit her second triple of the game to stretch the advantage to 39-14. After a Morgan State free throw, UK got a Key layup, a Boone layup and another Key layup to lead 45-15. UK would lead 47-20 at the half.
Kentucky scored the first four points of the third quarter on layups by Key and Strack. After a Morgan State three, UK got layups from Obi, Key, Obi and Strack, followed by a three from Boone. The 11-0 run gave the Cats a 62-23 advantage.
Morgan State scored three in a row before Boone made a triple, followed by a Lexi Blue basket that made it 67-26. After two Lady Bears’ free throws, Key scored on consecutive possessions to give UK a 71-28 lead. Kentucky led 77-31 after three periods.
In the fourth quarter, Kentucky got a three from Carroll and two Morgan free throws to extend the lead to 82-31. After a Morgan State three, UK got a three-point play from Obi and layups from Hassett and Morgan to stretch the lead to 89-34.
The Cats closed the game on a 5-1 run and the final score was the largest lead for UK in the game.
Kentucky returns to action on Wednesday, facing Miami (Fla.) in the ACC/SEC Challenge. Tipoff is set for 5 p.m. ET and the game can be seen on ESPN2.
