ROMEOVILLE, Ill. - The Lewis University women's basketball team picked up its first win of the season with an 80-70 victory over Quincy Sunday (Nov. 29) at Neil Carey Arena.
Kathryn Schmidt (Hampshiire, Ill./Burlington Central) paced the Flyers (1-1 overall, 1-1 in the Great Lakes Valley Conference) with 23 points and 13 rebounds.
Taylor Gugliuzza (New Lenox, Ill./Lincoln-Way West) added 14 points and six rebounds,
Lindsay Harrison (Yorkville, Ill./Yorkville) had 12 points and six rebounds,
Stephanie Hart (Geneva, Ill./Geneva) tallied 11 points, while
Jenna Badali (Oak Lawn, Ill./Mother McAuley) (7 steals, 5 assists) and
Grace Hilber (Sun Prairie, Wis./Sun Prairie) each had nine points.
The two teams went back-and-forth early with the Flyers taking their first lead of the game 9-8 on a free throw by Badali. A Harrison layup regained a Lewis lead at 11-10 before Quincy (0-2, 0-2) reeled off 12 straight points, paced by six from Jazzpher Evans to take a 22-11 lead with 1:34 left in the first quarter. Four straight points from the Flyers made it 22-15 after the first quarter.
The Hawks maintained their lead for much of the second quarter and held an 11-point advantage at 36-25 with 3:42 remaining in the first half. Lewis was able to hold Quincy scoreless the rest of the half and scored the final six points of the half to cut the deficit to 36-31 at the break.
Quincy held as big as a 12-point lead in the third quarter at 46-34 at the 7:04 mark when Lewis made its comeback. Three-pointers by Hart and Gugliuzza ignited a 12-0 run that tied the game at 46-46 with 3:23 remaining in the third quarter. After three points from the Hawks, the Flyers took the lead with five straight points on a steal and layup from Badali. The two teams ended the period tied at 55-55 after Hilber beat the buzzer with a jumper.
Lewis broke the game open in the fourth quarter, going on a 14-0 run over a 5:52 stretch of the quarter. The Flyers did not allow the Hawks a made field goal in the quarter until a layup with 1:51 left in the game broke the 14 straight points from the Flyers and made it a 74-61 Lewis lead.
The Flyers shot 13-of-36 from the floor (36.1 percent) and 0-of-8 from long range in the first half, but came back to go 17-of-31 (54.8 percent) in the second half and 4-of-6 (66.7 percent) from long range, finishing the game 30-for-67 (44.8 percent) from the floor. Meanwhile, they held Quincy to 3-of-12 (25 percent) shooting in the fourth quarter. They also forced 26 Quincy turnovers, resulting in 13 steals, while also outrebounding the Hawks 37-30.
Lewis continues its conference-only schedule Thursday (Dec. 3) when it travels to face Indianapolis at 4:30 p.m. CT.
