Southern Illinois University
2-5
Central Arkansas
2-6
Women's Basketball dominates Sugar Bears, 88-67
12/08/2007 | 12:00:00 | Women's Basketball
Dec. 8, 2007
By Shalae Patrick
www.siusalukis.com
CARBONDALE, Ill. - The Southern Illinois women's basketball team opened the game on a 26-4 run in the first nine and half minutes of play, cruising on to an 88-67 victory over Central Arkansas Saturday night in SIU Arena.
The win snapped a four-game losing streak for the Salukis (2-5), giving them their second victory of the season. The Sugar Bears fell to 2-6 on the year.
"A win is a win, and we're going to take it," Saluki head coach Dana Eikenberg said. "We had a better week of practice and obviously we have some issues to address, but I think we got off on two good starts in the first and in the second halves and that set the tone."
Southern put five players in double-digit scoring for the first time this season, including Jayme Sweere and Jasmine Gibson who stepped up to lead the team with 21 points each.
Sweere added a team-high six boards, three assists and a steal, while Gibson grabbed five rebounds, dishing out two assists and a steal.
Erica Smith recorded a nice line with 11 points, four boards, three assists, one block and a game-high five steals for the Salukis.
Freshman Katrina Swingler had a breakout game, recording 13 points, adding five rebounds and three steals, all career-bests.
"She has been working very hard in practice," Eikenberg said of the rookie. "What she did tonight will give her a lot of confidence."
Fellow freshman Ellen Young connected for 11 points, two boards and two assists.
The Salukis recorded 27 of their points off of forced turnovers (21) from the Sugar Bears, recording just seven turnovers in the game themselves.
"We talked about (scoring in transition) a lot this week," Eikenberg added. "We tried to be scrappy and if we can do that and keep the speed up the whole game we can get good shots and we did that well."
The Salukis return to action Dec. 17 when they host Chicago State in SIU Arena for a 7:05 p.m. tip-off.
