After a less-than-convincing victory in exhibition action against Minnesota State last Sunday, Marquette women’s basketball made a statement with an 87-37 victory over Longwood in their season opener Saturday.
“We had a long week of defense and the girls bought in. They really fixed what we needed to work on and what our weaknesses were from the past game, so it showed big,” said head coach Carolyn Kieger.
“Tons of confidence. Just our home opener we wanted, to come out and win and do this for our fans and for ourselves,” Forward Erika Davenport added. “We worked really hard this week, just making sure this win was big for us.”
Allazia Blockton led the way for the Golden Eagles with 19 points. Erika Davenport recorded her first double-double of the season with 18 points and 10 rebounds.
“Just being able to move the ball around and get inside out looks,” Davenport said of the keys to success. “We figured that if we kept shooting, if our shooters are hot we are getting the rebound regardless. Just getting inside out and if it went off we were hungry enough to get the rebound.”
Marquette opened the game on a 9-2 run and never looked back. The Golden Eagles headed into halftime up 44-19. They forced Longwood into 16 turnovers, which often led to quick transition points.
“I definitely think it gives us momentum,” Davenport said. “It gives us energy when we get up and press them. We just force turnovers and once we force turnovers we keep forcing turnovers. We just keep bringing that energy and I just feel like it helps influence our offense.”
With a comfortable lead in the second half, Kieger was able to let some of the freshmen get minutes. Altia Anderson got 10 minutes, while Isabelle Spingola scored seven points in seven minutes of action.
“I thought Altia looked great. Isabelle was great,” Kieger said. “If they can keep playing with like that with that energy, they are really going to help us. All we really want from our bench is to have energy and to come in and not drop and that is what happened in that fourth quarter they were able to come in and that energy didn’t drop, the intensity didn’t and the urgency didn’t, which is what we preach so I was really happy with the freshmen.”
The Golden Eagles will take on St. Francis-Pennsylvania Tuesday at 7 p.m. at the Al McGuire Center.
