Cajuns at Lady Eagles

??????????? It's never a good sign in a basketball game when it takes over 22 minutes to generate more points than turnovers.? Unfortunately, that's exactly what Louisiana's Ragin' Cajuns women's basketball team did on Thursday night, falling to the North Texas Lady Eagles by a final score of 88-34.?

The Cajuns needed a jumper by Sarah Richey with 17:30 left in the second half to give them 17 points and 16 turnovers.?

The Cajuns had 15 points and 15 turnovers at the half, en route to a 28-point halftime deficit.? North Texas generated 43 points on 50 percent shooting from the floor, compared to just 20.8 percent by the Cajuns.

UNT jumped out to a fast start on both ends, running up a 25-0 lead eight minutes into the contest.? The Lady Eagles combined tough defense with hot shooting, puzzling the Cajuns at both ends of the court.? UL Lafayette's first basket came off the hands of Brooke Williams, just over nine minutes into the game.? The Cajuns had ten turnovers in the first ten minutes.

The second half was no different, as the Lady Eagles' lead kept growing.? By midway through the half, coach Nix had emptied her bench, putting four freshman and a sophomore on the court.? In the meantime, North Texas head coach Tina Slinker kept All-American candidate Jalie Mitchell in the game for all but the final five minutes.

“I thought we would've had a better effort,” said Nix.? “Nothing seemed to work for us tonight.”

Breanna Evans led the Cajuns with nine points, while Amanda Caffey chipped in a career high eight.? With her lone block, Sarah Richey became the Cajuns all-time career leader in blocked shots with 81.? The injured Charlotte Green was the only one of 14 Cajuns not to play in the game.

The 54-point margin of defeat ties as the largest regular season defeat in the Gay Nix era, while the Cajuns' 34 points ties as the fifth lowest scoring output under Nix.

“We all know that we are much better than our performance tonight,” Nix added.? “We'll have to pick our heads up and look toward the next game.? It shouldn't be to hard to put this one behind us.”

The Cajuns will play at Denver on Saturday night, before returning home for three consecutive conference games beginning with South Alabama on Jan. 31.

UL Lafayette (34) EVANS 3-4 3-3 9; CAFFEY 3-9 2-3 8; QUALLS 2-6 0-0 4; PETRAKOVA 1-2 2-2 4; WILLIAMS 2-5 0-1 4; RICHEY 2-9 0-2 4; FINCHER 0-6 1-2 1; JOHNSON 0-2 0-0 0; STEWART 0-1 0-0 0; TOLSTON 0-1 0-0 0; FORD 0-3 0-0 0; NOEL 0-3 0-0 0; SIMON 0-3 0-3 0. Totals 13-54 8-16 34.

North Texas (88) STEPHENSON 11-15 1-4 25; MITCHELL 7-12 7-10 22; THOMAS 3-5 2-2 10;

BLANTON 3-5 1-2 7; TROUT 3-6 0-0 6; LEWIS 1-7 3-3 5; LEE 1-3 2-2 4; BROUSSARD 1-3 2-2 4; GRISMANAUSKAITE 1-3 0-0 2; HASKIN 1-5 0-0 2; READES 0-1 1-2 1; BREWER 0-2 0-0 0.

Totals 32-67 19-27 88.

Halftime-ULL 15, NT 43. 3-point goals-ULL 0-8 (CAFFEY 0-2; FINCHER 0-2; TOLSTON 0-1; FORD 0-2; NOEL 0-1), NT 5-12 (STEPHENSON 2-3; THOMAS 2-4; MITCHELL 1-2; LEWIS 0-2; BROUSSARD 0-1). Fouled out--ULL-None, NT-None. Rebounds-ULL 35 (EVANS 5), NT 51 (STEPHENSON 13). Assists-ULL 3 (QUALLS 1; PETRAKOVA 1; EVANS 1), NT 20 (READES 6). Total fouls-ULL 20, NT 19. A-746

University of Louisiana at Lafayette Athletics

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