RICHMOND, Va. (February 28) -- Old Dominion used a four-person doublefigure scoring attack to put away Virginia Commonwealth, 93-82, Wednesdaynight in Colonial Athletic Association women?s action at the ALLTEL Pavilion at theStuart C. Siegel Center. With the win, the Lady Monarchs improve to 18-8 overall and14-1 in the conference. The Rams fall to 15-11 overall and 6-9 in the CAA.
The Rams started the game strong, taking a 13-7 lead in the firstfive minutes with sophomore forward Kristine Austgulen scoring seven points during thatstretch. Austgulen continued her hot shooting as she scored 13 of her team's first 17points, but Old Dominion countered with sophomore guard Okeisha Howard (VirginiaBeach, Va.) who netted her team?s first 12 points.
After a 30-second timeout called by Old Dominion and a media timeout,the Lady Monarchs went on one of their patented runs, scoring 17 of the next20 points, including eight by freshman Myriah Spence (Espanola, NM) and 11 by HamchetouMaiga (Bamako, Mali) to take a commanding 31-22 lead with 6:50 on theclock. The Lady Monarchs would increase their advantage to 12 before the Rams battledback to cut the deficit to eight, 44-36, at the end of the half.
In the second half, the Lady Monarchs maintained a lead thefluctuated between eight and 18 points. Old Dominion would use 10 second-half points fromTiffany Thompson (Clinton, Md.) to push the lead to 69-52 with 12:29 remaining, butthe Rams would go on a 12-6 run to get within 11 points, 75-64 at the 8:07 mark. TheLady Monarchs again stretched the advantage to 18 with a 9-2 run to put the game out ofreach.
The Lady Monarchs were led by Maiga?s fifth double double of theseason. The swing player collected a career high 27 points (on 12-of-18 shooting) and11 rebounds. Howard followed closely behind with 21 points on 7-of-12 shootingfrom the field. Spence (14 points) and Thompson (10 points) rounded out the topscorers for Old Dominion. Old Dominion will wrap up the regular season with a 7 pm game atRichmond Saturday evening. The Lady Monarchs will then defend their 10-time CAAChampionship as the top seed in the 2001 ALLTEL Women?s CAA Championship at the OldDominion University Fieldhouse March 8-10.