Feb. 11, 2012

Box Score

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. - The Samford women's basketball team held Georgia Southern to just 26.3 percent shooting, including 17.4 percent from three-point range, on its way to a 67-41 Southern Conference win over the Eagles Saturday afternoon at the Pete Hanna Center.

Samford held Georgia Southern to just 11 points in the first half, on its way to a 31-11 lead at the break. The 11 point total in the first half was a season low for the first half and tied a season low for either half for the Bulldog defense.

"This was definitely a good game and a good response to a bad performance at Wofford (Monday)," Samford head coach Mike Morris said. "We played great team defense, I thought. This was as good of a 20 minutes as we've played in terms of defense in the first half. Our leadership was good and our play was good. We also had great play from our bench."

The Samford bench scored 28 points, compared to 18 for the GSU reserves. The Bulldogs outrebounded the Eagles, 38-35, and Samford scored 20 points off of 14 GSU turnovers.

Samford was led in scoring by sophomore guard Shelby Campbell with 15 points. Junior forward Hannah Dawson and freshman forward Taylor Reece added 10 points each. Dawson led the team in rebounding, pulling down seven boards in the win. Sophomore guard Kendall Schwantz grabbed a career-high six rebounds, to go along with her five points.

For Georgia Southern, Samantha Williams led the way with nine points. Anna Claire Knight added seven points for the Eagles.

In the first half, Samford scored the first eight points of the game to take an early lead. Georgia Southern fought back to cut the lead to three points at 12-9 with 11:27 to go in the first half after a three-pointer by Knight.

Samford answered with a 19-0 run to take a 31-9 lead with 3:18 to go in the half after a three-point play by Campbell. Georgia Southern's next basket came with 39 seconds to go in the first half on a jumper by Knight to make the score 31-11 heading into halftime. The shot ended a GSU drought that lasted nearly 11 minutes.

In the first half, the Eagles made just 16 percent of their shots, and 12.5 percent of their three-pointers. Samford made 46.7 percent of its shots in the first half.

Samford pushed its lead out to 24 points early in the second half at 38-14 with 16:43 to go after a three-pointer by Reece. Georgia Southern scored the next eight points to cut the Samford lead to 16 at 38-22 with 14:07 to go after a layup by Williams.

With Samford leading, 42-27, the Bulldogs went on an 11-2 run to push its lead out to 24 points at 53-29 with 9:48 left after a three-pointer by Schwantz. Samford pushed its lead out to as much as 28 points at 67-39 with 1:28 to go after a pair of free throws by Campbell.

With the win, Samford improved to 14-9 overall and 9-5 in Southern Conference play. Samford is now 8-0 in home games so far this season. Georgia Southern drops to 7-17 overall and 3-12 in league play.

Samford will return to action on Monday, Feb. 13, when the Bulldogs play host to College of Charleston. The game is Samford's Play4Kay Game to raise money and awareness for breast cancer research. The game is scheduled for a 7 p.m. start from the Pete Hanna Center.