FIU women's basketball outscored UAB 31-11 in points off turnovers and got its first conference win of 2016, in a 72-61 victory over the Blazers at Lime Court at FIU Arena Thursday night.
The league win was the first for new FIU Head Coach
Marlin Chinn and the first for the program since February 22, 2014. FIU is now 3-18 on the season, 1-9 in Conference USA. UAB sits at 10-11, 3-7 in league games.
"I was proud of the way that we fought tonight," said Chinn after the game. "We have proven we can come out and play 20 minutes, but we needed to see if we can play 40 and that's the effort they had to give tonight."
The game marked the return of 6-foot-2 junior
Brianna Wright (Titusville, Florida / Titusville HS), who added some needed size to the rotation in her 23 minutes of action. She deflected passes into the paint, grabbed seven big rebounds and scored her only bucket of the game off an offensive rebound, helping the Panthers win 12-8 in second-chance points.
It all started with a monster first quarter for the Panthers, holding the Blazers scoreless over the last 3:25. FIU dropped a pair of quick threes in the last two minutes to take a 15-7 lead at the end of the period. The Panthers were even with the Blazers with 11 rebounds, while forcing six big turnovers in the frame to start. FIU held UAB to 3-of-14 shooting out of the gate, starting with a 1-of-8 stretch in the first five minutes.
The Blazers made a run in the second quarter, reversing the fortunes of the first. UAB limited FIU to 4-of-16 shooting in the period, until sophomore
Amari Hawkins (Pickerington, Ohio) got a steal and a layup to beat the buzzer and give the Panthers a 29-27 halftime lead.
The Panthers got down by as many as six in the third, but an 11-4 run to end the period allowed FIU to get a 48-46 lead after the period. It was their fifth lead after three periods this season. The Panthers now 3-2 in games with a lead at the start of the fourth quarter. Senior
Taylor Shade (Boynton Beach, Florida / Community HS) scored 12 of her career-high-tying 26 points in the period. It was her 50
th-career game with 10-or-more points and the fifth time breaching the 20-point mark.
"We wanted to come out and be aggressive tonight," said Shade. "Coach Chinn has been challenging us to take it to the basket and we tried hard to keep doing that tonight."
The Panthers were able to ice the game by shooting .700 in the fourth, their best fourth-quarter percentage of the season. Senior
Destini Feagin (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania) led all players with nine points in the final period, en route to a career-high 19 points in the contest. She added seven rebounds, including a team-best five on the offensive glass.
The Panthers also got 10 points from freshman point guard
Kristian Hudson (Birmingham, Alabama).
UAB's Brittany Winborne secured a double-double, with 11 points and 12 rebounds. She was limited to 2-of-3 shooting on the night, but hit seven of UAB's nine made free throws in the loss.
FIU will host Middle Tennessee Saturday at 2 p.m. The game will be the Panthers' Play 4Kay game, with the team raising money and awareness for breast cancer research.
For women's basketball ticket information, contact the FIU Ticket Office at 305-FIU-GAME or log onto
www.FIUSports.com.
Fans are encouraged to follow the Panthers on Twitter (@FIUWBB) and become a fan on Facebook (Facebook.com/FIUWBasketball) for all the latest FIU women's basketball news. Follow all of FIU's 18 athletic teams on Google+ (FIU Athletics), Twitter (@FIUAthletics), Facebook (Facebook.com/FIUSports), YouTube (FIUPanthers), and Instagram (FIUathletics).
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About FIU Athletics: FIU Athletics is home to more than 400 student-athletes in 18 different sports. Athletic events are played in seven different venues on FIU's campuses (Modesto A. Maidique and Biscayne Bay), including FIU Arena and at the FIU Football Stadium.
About FIU: Florida International University is recognized as a Carnegie engaged university. Its colleges and schools offer more than 180 bachelor¹s, master¹s and doctoral programs in fields such as engineering, international relations, architecture, law and medicine. As one of South Florida's anchor institutions, FIU is Worlds Ahead in its local and global engagement, finding solutions to the most challenging problems of our time. FIU emphasizes research as a major component of its mission. FIU has awarded 200,000 degrees and enrolls 50,000 students in two campuses and three centers including FIU Downtown on Brickell and the Miami Beach Urban Studios. FIU is a member of Conference USA and has 400 student-athletes participating in 18 sports. For more information about FIU, visit
http://www.fiu.edu/.
