DURANT, Okla. - The Arkansas Tech women's basketball team starts the new year continuing to build upon their strong season as they take down Southeastern 57-38 on the road. Following their road win, the Golden Suns advance to 6-3 overall and now stand 4-1 in Great American Conference play. They also boast a perfect 3-0 record on the road against GAC opponents.
On the way to their win over the Savage Storm, the Golden Suns applied tremendous defensive pressure to the Southeastern offense forcing them to fall short on their shots throughout the duration of the evening. Particularly, the Golden Suns defense did a stellar job at forcing misses from long range as they held the Savage Storm to just 10.5% (2-of-19) shooting from beyond-the-arc. They also made it difficult for Southeastern to make buckets from field goal range holding their offense to a 25.4% (16-of-63) clip from the floor for the game.
The Golden Suns notched a season-high as a team in total blocked shots for the game with eight to add to the excellent defensive presence against the Savage Storm. For each of the final three quarters of play, Tech held Southeastern to just single digits in scoring only allowing 22 total points during the second, third and fourth quarters combined. Meanwhile, the Golden Suns increased their scoring output in every quarter of the game.
Only five members of the entire Southeastern team scored at all, while just two players managed to score more than two points as the Golden Suns defense dominated at every turn.
During the second half of the game, the Golden Sun offense kicked into high gear as they outscored the Savage Storm by 20 points at 37-17. The fourth quarter was especially strong as they shot 50% as a team from field goal range and hit their three-pointers at a 66.7% clip. The Golden Sun offense dropped 24 total points in the fourth quarter, alongside their strong defensive play, to help elevate them to the road win.
Offensively, the team was led by senior guard
Kaley Shipman in scoring. The Mountain View, Ark. native dropped her season-high in points scoring 20 for the Golden Suns. Shipman also scored the ball with high efficiency from long range as she knocked down her three-point shots at a 50.0% overall clip. The senior guard added four rebounds, three assists and three steals to her season-high scoring night to lift the Golden Suns to their win over Southeastern.
Also adding to the offensive output in the game was freshman guard
Claudia Bridges who scored nine points on the evening. Bridges provided a lift in controlling the flow of the offense for the Golden Suns with five assists, while also adding four rebounds and a steal.
Alex Hill rounds out the leading scorers for the Golden Suns with seven total points. Hill also collected five rebounds, two steals and blocked a shot in the road win.
Locking down the defensive effort for the Golden Suns was the pair of
Sarah Edmondson and
Marta Duda who blocked two shots each and made up half of the total blocks for the Golden Suns. Edmondson also provided a lift in scoring in the paint off the bench with six points and finished a perfect 3-of-3 on her shot attempts for the night.
The Golden Suns will stay on the road for their next outing as they get ready to make the trip over to Ada, Okla. in preparation for their Saturday afternoon conference game against East Central. Saturday's conference game against the Tigers is set for a 1 p.m. tip-off that afternoon.
