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MOREHEAD, Ky. – Sophomore
Ashar Harris was a woman on a mission Sunday. The 5-11 Morehead State forward registered career highs of 30 points, seven assists, seven steals and grabbed 13 rebounds as the Eagles won their third straight game, 75-60, over the Norfolk State Spartans.
MSU, which won all three games in its own Comfort Inn and Suites Classic, improved to 3-2. The Spartans lost their first contest of the 2010-11 season to fall to 3-1.
“That’s Ashar,” said coach
Tom Hodges. “We see that kind of effort from her just about every day, and sometimes its positive and other times its negative, but when she is working that hard in the paint for us, we have to find a way to get her the ball and reward her for her effort.”
Harris was 12-of-19 from the floor and grabbed five of her 13 boards on the offensive end as she played a team high 37 minutes while picking up no fouls. MSU also got another double digit effort from its other low post player, redshirt sophomore
Channing Hillman, as she totaled 15 points and hauled in six rebounds.
Linda Dixon scored eight and tallied seven rebounds, while
Courtney Lumpkin handed off a team best six assists.
“I’m very pleased with our record and that we were able to get three wins. Playing three games in three straight days is tough, but I was pleased with our effort, especially today in the first half,” said Hodges. “I thought we could have had a little more effort in the second half, but I told our team that we have championship potential, and I did see flashes this weekend that we can be a very good basketball team if we just work together and work hard as a team.”
Norfolk State got a double-double from Batavia Owens with her 17 points and 11 rebounds. The Spartans edged the Eagles in the rebounding column, 40-38, but MSU forced 25 turnovers and had 11 steals while making only 12 turnovers itself in the game.
Both teams shot nearly the same as the Spartans finished at 45 percent and MSU shot at a 43 percent clip (29-of-67).
The Eagles built an enormous first half lead and then held on as NSU put together a couple of mini rallies in the second half. The Eagles went into halftime with a 37-19 lead as they held NSU to only 32 percent from the field and only eight made field goals.
MSU increased its lead to 40-21 with 19:21 left in the game after
Chynna Bozeman’s only three-pointer. But, the Spartans outscored the Eagles 12-4 over the next four minutes to trim the deficit to just 12 (44-32). MSU pushed the lead back out to 17 but saw NSU trim it back down to 12 (51-39) with 10:33 left in the game. The Eagles then outscored the Spartans 14-7 as the clock ran down to 4:55. At that point, the Eagles had built their largest lead at 66-46.
The Eagles will travel to Miami, Fla., this week for the Florida International Thanksgiving Classic. MSU faces the host team on Friday at 6 p.m. and then plays either Western Michigan or Indiana State at either 2 or 4 p.m. Sunday afternoon. The games can be heard live on the Eagle Sports Network on WIVY-FM 96.3 and on www.msueagles.com.
