MOREHEAD, Ky. –Morehead State Women's Basketball team showed veteran poise down the stretch on its way to knocking off defending Big South Conference champion Radford, 73-62, on Saturday afternoon at Johnson Arena.
The Eagles, now 3-4 overall in 2019-20, made 18-of-20 (.900) foul shots in the fourth quarter to seal the win and end their two-game losing skid. For the game, Morehead State hit on 24-of-26 (.923) freebies. The 92% clip from the line is a program best since 2000 when attempting at least 26 free throws.
Defensively the Eagles also finished strong as they forced the Highlanders to miss on their final six shot attempts in the game.
"We're excited to get this win," said MSU head coach
Greg Todd. "Coach (Mike) McGuire has done a tremendous job with (Radford) and for us to be able to execute down the stretch the way we did from the free throw line and on defense is something we use to build confidence going forward."
Senior guard
Breuna Jackson scored a game-high 17 points and knocked down three trifectas which tied a career-best day from beyond the arc. Four Eagles accompanied Jackson in double figures as sophomore
Ellie Jo Johnson finished with 12 points while senior
Jaleesa Avery and sophomore
Jazzmyn Elston each tallied 11 points.
On the glass, freshman
Ariel Kirkwood grabbed a career-high 13 rebounds to help Morehead State to a 40-36 advantage on the glass.
Kirkwood, a six-foot guard from Milwaukee, has now tallied three double-digit rebounding games which is the most for an MSU freshman through seven games since Ashar Harris accomplished the feat in the first four games of an All-OVC Second Team rookie campaign in 2009-10.
Radford falls to 2-4 with the loss. The Highlanders were led by Amele Ngwafang with 14 points and nine rebounds.
Morehead State has now won games in back-to-back seasons over Radford and now leads the all-time series 6-5.
Next up, the Eagles travel to Dayton, Ohio for their matchup against the Flyers since the 1995-96 season. Morehead State and Dayton are slated to face off on Thursday at 11:00 a.m. ET at UD Arena.
