WKU Uses Balanced Effort to Battle Past Evansville, 92-54

Thursday, November 30

Bowling Green, Ky.

7 P.M. CT

Western Kentucky University

4-3

Evansville

2-3

Evansville

WKU

11/30/2017 10:20:00 PM | Women's Basketball

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BOWLING GREEN, Ky. – Double-double efforts from both Raneem Elgedawy and Ivy Brown and a balanced scoring effort with four players in double figures helped WKU to a 92-54 win over Evansville inside E.A. Diddle Arena on Thursday evening, the third consecutive win for the Lady Toppers.

Elgedawy hit career highs with 19 points and 10 rebounds and Ivy Brown notched her third consecutive double-double with 12 points and 10 boards to lead the Lady Toppers (4-3). C-USA's leading scorer, Tashia Brown, finished with a game-high 20 points on 9-of-19 shooting from the floor, and freshman Sherry Porter rounded out the quartet in double figures with 16 points, 10 of which came in the final quarter of play.

As a team, WKU enjoyed its best shooting performance of the season, going 37-of-73 (50.7 percent) from the field in Thursday's outing. The Lady Toppers forced 21 turnovers and converted those into 28 points and were dominant inside the paint, outscoring the Purple Aces 56-16 in that category.

Marley Miller scored a team-best 17 points for Evansville (2-3) and was joined in double figures by Kerri Gasper (15) and Hannah Noe (13). Evansville knocked down 10 of their 21 three-pointers on the night but could not overcome a strong outing from WKU.

WKU came out of the gates firing and scored the first 11 points of the game with four different scorers contributing to the stretch. Elgedawy chipped in four early points as both baskets came off offensive rebounds and putbacks, and a jumper from Tashia Brown at the 7:25 mark pushed the early Lady Topper advantage to double digits.

That lead grew to as many as 19 points before the close of the first period off a takeaway and layup from Nichel Tampa, but Evansville's Noe trimmed the lead to just 24-7 at the end of the quarter after hitting a late three-pointer for the Purple Aces.

Midway through the second quarter, Evansville cut WKU's lead to just 13 points, 31-18, with 6:41 to play. Noe knocked down a trio of three-pointers on three straight possessions, and Miller's layup capped the quick run.

WKU answered right back, however, scoring 14 straight points over the next four minutes to build its largest lead of the night to that point. Whitney Creech's layup with 2:49 on the clock pushed the Lady Toppers' advantage to 45-18, and WKU would enter the locker room with a 52-26 edge three minutes later.

Evansville put together a 10-2 run early in the third quarter to slash WKU's lead back under 20 points, but WKU fired back by scoring nine of the final 11 points of the frame to push the lead back to 24 points, 73-49.

The Lady Toppers never allowed the Purple Aces any closer than that in the fourth quarter and finished the game on an 11-0 run over the final 6:18 of the game to reach the final scoreline. Porter scored six points during the run for the Lady Toppers and finished with 10 points in the final quarter alone.

With the conclusion of Thursday's matchup, WKU will now take a nine-day break for final exams for the fall semester before returning to the court on Sunday, Dec. 10, on the road at Southern Illinois with a tipoff time scheduled for 2 p.m. The Lady Toppers hold a narrow 7-6 edge in the all-time series against the Salukis, including an 88-71 win in the most recent meeting on Nov. 23, 2007.