Box Score
DENTON, Texas - Abilene Christian's women's basketball team made just eight first-half field goals and went into the break down by 14 points en route to a 70-57 loss Sunday afternoon at the North Texas Super Pit to the Antelopes of Grand Canyon University.
The Lopes remain undefeated at 4-0 with the victory, while the Wildcats fell to 4-2.
Judy Jones led GCU with a double-double of 19 points and 11 rebounds, and was solid from the floor in hitting 8-of-11 field goal attempts. Kaitlyn Peterson made two treys in finishing with 17 points and Deanna Daniels had 15 points to go along with three steals.
For the Wildcats, they received 15 points from freshmen
Alexis Mason (6-8) and 11 each from
Suzzy Dimba and
Sydney Shelstead. Senior
Renata Marquez led ACU's rebounding efforts with 10 boards in addition to her eight points.
Marquez hit ACU's first three of the game and Mason nailed its second within the first minute as the Wildcats jumped out to quick 6-2 lead. But less than 60-seconds later, the Antelopes received consecutive layups from Jones and Peterson and never again looked back again as the first-year WAC members took off on a 12-1 run that put them up by eight (15-7) with 13:42 left in the first half.
ACU got back to within four points on two occassions, but another big GCU rally capped by a Daniels' 3-pointer gave the Lopes their first double-digit lead of the afternoon at 27-17 and 6:39 remaining.
Then in the closing seconds, GCU's Astrea Reed pulled down an offensive rebound following a missed 3-pointer and put it back for a layup that made it 39-25 at halftime.
GCU finished with over 50 percent shooting in the first half at .536, while the Wildcats added only six more field goals after their back-to-back 3-pointers to start the contest. ACU couldn't get its treys to fall in the second half either and finished the game 5-of-19 (.263).
The Wildcats' shot a little better in the second half (.423), and outscored the Antelopes by one point over the final 20 minutes, 32-31, but only really began to reduce their deficit after GCU had taken its biggest lead of the night at 23 points, 61-38, with 15 minutes remaining in the game.
A 3-pointer from Marquez followed by two free throws from
Lizzy Dimba made it a 13-point game and the Wildcats kept the Antelopes lead under 20 points the rest of the way. A layup by
Whitney West with under three minutes to go trimmed the Wildcats' deficit to 11, but Daniels responded with two more free throws on GCU's next possession and then both teams went scoreless over the final 2:15.
GCU finished the game with a .448 field-goal percentage (26-58) and made 5-of-15 3-pointers.
The Wildcats' three-game road trip concludes Wednesday night at
Julie Goodenough's alma mater of Texas-Arlington. Tip-off is set for 7:30 p.m. and will be broadcast on Abilene's 98.1 FM - The Ticket.
