CMU earns second straight road win over NIU
With that stakes high in a battle for a potential top spot in the Mid-American Conference West Division standings, the Central Michigan women’s basketball team needed to go on the road and keep their momentum rolling.
The Chippewas didn't flinch.
CMU came out and played with a fire in their step right from the start, and topped Northern Illinois 109-94 in Dekalb on Wednesday night.
Lead by it’s bigs, CMU dominated inside tonight. Junior forward Tinara Moore had 16 points and 10 rebounds to give her a double-double. Sophomore forward Reyna Frost joined Moore with a double-double as well, totaling 24 points and 18 rebounds.
Head coach Sue Guevara said that the effort inside really told the story of tonights contest.
“We played good defense for the most part, we lost some people but knew it would be a shootout,” Guevara said. “The rebounding tells the story, we talk about it all the time, defense wins championships and tonight it got us the win.”
Both teams came out in this game hot in this game, as the Huskies went on a 8-2 run to end the first quarter making the score 25-23 CMU.
In the second quarter, the Chippewas took control of the game and never let go. CMU went on a 23-3 run that went for nearly seven minutes, highlighted by 3-points from junior guard Cassie Breen and junior guard Aleah Swary.
The Chippewas ended up outscoring the Huskies 31-17 in the second quarter, to take a 56-40 lead into the locker room. CMU out-rebounded the Huskies 33-16 in the first half, with a 13-2 advantage on the offensive end.
For the game CMU out-rebounded the Huskies 58-30, which was the biggest difference in the game. Another key component for CMU’s victory was Swary’s season-high 21 bench points, NIU could only produce six.
Swary said that her shooting was opened up due to the inside play from her teammates tonight.
“Really it all started with the double teams in the post, our post has been strong the past couple of games and that opened it up for me to shoot,” Swary said. “Tonight it was really just about rebounding, but we gave up a lot of points so we need to play better defense moving forward.”
The Chippewas ended up shooting 48.8 percent from the field but just 28.6 percent (8-for-28) from beyond the arc.
CMU improved their road record to 4-5, and for the first time all season put back-to-back 100 plus point games up, both of which came away from McGuirk Arena.
Guevara said that Swary impressed her more than anything else in this game tonight.
“Aleah Swary came off of that bench today and gave us 21 points in 34 minutes plus seven rebounds,” Guevara said. “We had to take out (Tinara) Moore at times tonight, and that’s where we had to replace her with a shooter, and (Aleah) Swary came up big.”
Sophomore guard Presley Hudson quietly had a big night scoring, as she scored 24 points on 6-for-16 shooting from the floor while adding nine assists and six rebounds. Breen had a solid night on the offensive end, tallying 16 points while adding three assists. While senior forward Jewel Cotton only had eight points, she grabbed 13 boards which helped with CMU’s rebounding advantage.
With the win, the Chippewas are now tied for second place with NIU in the MAC-West Division. Ball State (17-7, 10-2) defeated Bowling Green to gain first place by one-half game.
The Chippewas will be back at McGuirk Arena Saturday to take on in-state rival Western Michigan. The game is scheduled to start at 1 p.m. as the Chippewas go for their 12th home win.
