ABILENE –
Bella Earle and
Payton Hull re-enacted their phenomenal performances from the weekend in a 94-76 Abilene Christian win to open Western Athletic Conference action on Wednesday.
Earle had her second consecutive triple-double and Hull followed up with another 30-point outing. Earle finished with 19 points, 10 rebounds and 10 assists while Hull had six three-pointers and ended up with 31 points.
But the postgame talk was all about the team effort. ACU had 25 assists and 18 three-pointers and dominated the rebound column 45-24.
"I think that we learned on Sunday how important it is to share the basketball and really read the defense and find people who have really good looks at the basket," said ACU Head Coach
Julie Goodenough. "Twenty-five assists. There's nothing else you can say besides we were really sharing the ball and playing good team basketball."
Claire Graham joined the headlining duo in double-figure scoring with 11 points to lead a 31-point bench scoring effort.
For the game, ACU was 32 of 61 (53 percent) from the field and 18 of 35 (51 percent) from three-point range.
The talk of the night, however, was the back-to-back big games. Earle had 13 points, 12 rebounds and 10 assists on Sunday at Navy while Hull tied the school Division-I era scoring high with 34 points.
"I'm just gonna expect that to be the standard for both of them," Goodenough quipped. "To score 30 points is phenomenal. You've got to have teammates that are finding you when you're open, plus you've got to be able to create some scoring opportunities on your own. For Payton, to be able to do that in your fifth college game and her sixth college game; it's pretty impressive.
"
Bella Earle. Triple doubles. Those don't come very often. There are not very many that have occurred in this season among men's and women's D-I teams. So for her to get back-to-back games of doing that, it's phenomenal. You gotta rely on your teammates to hit the shots when she delivers the pass. Bella takes a lot of pride and rebounding, and she's just been a beast on the boards for us."
Earle entered the game as one of seven players with triple-doubles and became the first to go back-to-back this season. Only one of the other six players was in action on Wednesday – Charlisse Leger-Walker of Washington State. She is the first Wildcat to go back-to-back with triple-doubles.
Hull also is the first ACU player in the D-I era to get back-to-back 30-point games and now has the Nos. 1 and 6 on the single-game scoring list.
The 18 three-pointers are the second-best DI effort for ACU; 19 being the record in 2020 against UT-Tyler. The last 18-three-pointer game was in 2014 against Arlington Baptist. The 25 assists is a DI-era top-10 mark. The record is 30.
The Wildcats trailed for a good portion of the first quarter before Hull got a three-point play and a three-pointer for a 6-0 run and a 20-19 ACU lead. The Cats carried a 29-25 lead into the second period.
Aspen Thornton buried a three-pointer midway through the second quarter for ACU's first 10-point lead, 43-33. UTA was able to get to within 49-45 by halftime.
ACU led by as many as 14 points in the third quarter and stretched the lead out to 29 (83-54) on a
Claire Graham three-pointer with 5:51 remaining.
The WAC opening win puts the Wildcats at 4-2 overall and 1-0 in the league with a trip to Stephen F. Austin coming on Saturday afternoon.
