The UCA women’s basketball team handily defeated the University of North Alabama Lions 73-52 for its 11th straight win Feb. 12.
The Sugar Bears (18-6, ASUN 12-1) immediately sprinted out to a 6-point lead, with senior guard Jade Upshaw scoring the first 8 points for UCA.
The Lions (12-12, ASUN 7-6) struggled against UCA’s defense, as the Sugar Bears pushed ahead to extend their lead to 10 points.
North Alabama was able to slash the Sugar Bears’ lead to six after a 4-0 run to close the first quarter.
Upshaw scored 11 points in the first seven and a half minutes of the game, which included three 3-pointers.
“Usually, I’m kind of swarmed pretty fast off the jump,” Upshaw said. “They’re usually trying to deny every pass to me. But I usually find a way to [score] pretty quick.”
UCA maintained a lead of no less than 9 points through the second quarter, and after the Lions started to close the gap, the Sugar Bears went on a 9-4 scoring run to extend their lead to 14 to end the half.
Senior guard Leah Mafua racked up 10 points in the first half, and senior forward Bree Stephens put up five rebounds, four assists, and three blocks.
In the first half, the Sugar Bears held the Lions to 26 percent shooting, with enough stops to lead by double-figures going into the second half.
The Lions looked to close the gap that UCA built in the first half, but the Sugar Bears rocketed ahead in the third quarter, with Upshaw and Mafua scoring 8 out of the first 10 points of the second half.
At one point in the third quarter, the Sugar Bears led North Alabama by 24 points.
The Lions were able to close at the end of the quarter, entering the fourth quarter in a 20-point deficit to the Sugar Bears.
UCA did not look back in the fourth quarter, only dipping below a 20-point lead once before immediately taking it back to take the lead to 21 points.
The Sugar Bears’ 21-point lead would remain for the remainder of the game, which secured their 11th consecutive ASUN win.
“In college basketball, not many teams in any league, men or women, have put together a run like this,” UCA women’s basketball coach Tony Kemper said. “We have not had our best every time, and we’ve had to navigate that. And I think their ability to learn what is needed in the moments. I think it’s really grown over the last 11; 12 games.”
“I think that the Bellarmine game, I can’t look at and say, didn’t help us,” Kemper said. “It was tough to deal with at the time. They played extremely well late in the game. We did not, and I think, I think we learned a little bit from that, and we pressed forward.”
“We’re still hungry and we know that just nine in a row isn’t enough; we want to keep winning,” Upshaw said. “We don’t really want to have that taste in our mouths against Bellarmine after that first loss.”
The 73-52 win set UCA up to lock a top-two seed for the ASUN Conference Championship in March heading into their Feb. 15 game against the Austin Peay Governors.
Upshaw ended the game with 23 points, followed by Mafua with 15 points and senior guard Kinley Fisher with 8 points.
In addition, senior forward Bree Stephens scored 7 points and had 11 rebounds for the Sugar Bears.
The Sugar Bears defeated the Governors in their Saturday rematch 77-67 to increase their winning streak to 12, as well as lock a top-two seed in the ASUN Conference Championship.
UCA will host top-seed and reigning ASUN champion Florida Gulf Coast University Eagles at 6:30 p.m. Thursday, Feb. 20, in the Farris Center. The game will determine the No. 1 seed for the ASUN Conference Championship.