BIRMINGHAM, Ala. – The Samford women's basketball team earned an impressive 90-81 win over Furman in Southern Conference action Saturday afternoon in the Pete Hanna Center.
 
The 90 points are the most Samford has ever scored on a SoCon game. Samford improves to 8-11 overall and 3-2 in SoCon play. Furman falls to 9-9 overall and 2-2 in league games.
 
"This was an extremely tough team, a very physical team," Samford head coach Carley Kuhns said. "They're one of the best rebounding teams in the country, so our focus today was really defensively to try to get stops and rebound the ball. I'm proud of those kids for stepping up and making shots. I thought we really shared the ball well. We got good ball movement, which I didn't think we got great ball movement on Thursday. We just shared the ball and found the open teammate. It was a fun game to coach and I'm really really proud of the response from this team."
 
As a team, Samford shot 52.9 percent from the floor and 53.3 percent from three-point range. Andrea Cournoyer led Samford with 29 points and six assists. Natalie Armstrong had 15 points and five rebounds, while Shauntai Battle added 13 points. Sanaa Redmond had 11 points and eight assists, while Sussy Ngulefac scored 10 points for the Bulldogs.
 
For Furman, Sydney James led the way with 21 points and six rebounds. Tierra Hodges added 18 points, seven rebounds and four assists for the Paladins.
 
Samford took an early 6-4 lead after a layup by Annie Ramil with 6:26 to go in the first quarter. Furman scored the next four points to take an 8-6 lead at the 5:40 mark in the first quarter following a pair of free throws by Grace Van Rij. Samford answered with an 8-0 run to take a 14-8 lead with 4:47 left in the first quarter after three free throws by Mallory Hampton. Samford pushed its lead out to nine points at 20-11 after a three-point play by Ramil with 1:41 left in the opening period. Samford held a 21-13 lead at the end of the first quarter.
 
Furman cut the lead to three points at 21-18 with 7:30 to go in the second quarter after a layup by James. Samford answered with a 7-0 run to build a 10-point lead at 28-18 with 5:17 to go in the quarter after a three-pointer by Cournoyer. Furman came back to cut the lead to three points at 30-27 with 2:46 to play in the second quarter after a three-pointer by James. After Samford pushed the lead back to 35-30, Furman closed the quarter on a 7-0 run to take a 37-35 lead into the locker room at halftime.
 
Furman built a six-point lead at 47-41 with 6:03 to go in the third quarter after a three-pointer by Tate Walters. Samford fought back to tie the score at 54-54 with 1:45 left in the third period on a layup by Ngulefac. After Furman retook the lead at 58-56, Samford's Battle nailed a three-pointer to give Samford a 59-58 lead with 23 seconds left in the quarter. Samford held the one-point advantage heading into the final period.
 
The Bulldogs opened the fourth quarter with a 12-0 run to push their lead to 71-58 with 6:59 to go on two free throws by Redmond. Furman answered with a 9-0 run of its own to cut the lead to 71-67 with 4:58 left after a three-pointer by James. Samford built the lead back to seven points at 78-71 on a layup by Ngulefac with 3:12 left. After Furman cut the lead to 78-74, Samford scored the next four points to take an 82-74 lead on a steal and breakaway layup by Cournoyer. Armstrong and Cournoyer both hit key free throws down the stretch to pull out the 90-81 win.
 
Samford will travel to Macon, Ga., to take on the Mercer Bears on Saturday, Jan. 29. The game is set for a 1:30 p.m. (CT) start from Mercer's Hawkins Arena.



 

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