Wake Forest Athletics
Wake Forest University
SMU
Brittany Waters' 22 Points Leads Wake Forest Past SMU 66-49
1/3/2011 12:00:00 AM | Women's Basketball
Jan. 3, 2011
Final Stats | Final Stats in PDF Format
WINSTON-SALEM, NC - Wake Forest senior Brittany Waters scored 22 points and grabbed six rebounds to lead the Demon Deacons to a 66-49 victory over visiting SMU Monday evening at the Joel Coliseum.
The win lifts the Deacons back over .500 on the year at 8-7 while the loss snaps the Mustangs two-game winning streak and drops them to 7-6 on the season.
Waters finished the game with a season-high tying 22 points while also totaling six rebounds and five steals. The Orlando, Fla., native has played well over the last three games, averaging 18 points and six rebounds per contest and has a total of 10 steals.
In addition to Waters, sophomores Lakevia Boykin and Sandra Garcia each finished with 13 points on the evening. Garcia was a perfect 6-of-6 from the floor and also grabbed two rebounds while Boykin tied a career-high with five rebounds.
Freshman Chelsea Douglas came through for the Deacs in a couple of tough spots, finishing the game 2-of-3 from beyond the arc for six points. She also led the team with five assists which tied her season-high.
For the Mustangs, Christine Elliott scored 11 points and grabbed a team-high eight rebounds while Raquel Christian finished with 10 points and two steals.
The story of the game came in the paint where the Deacs held the upper-hand all night. Wake outrebounded SMU 53-34 (+19) which was its largest rebounding edge since playing IUPUI on Nov. 28. The Deacons also doubled-up SMU 36-18 on points in the paint and scored 16 second chance points off 20 offensive rebounds.
Waters and Garcia scored 14 of the Deacs first 15 points as Wake climbed out to an early 15-6 lead. The Mustangs would then chip-away at the lead and off six-straight points from Delisha Willis, SMU trimmed the lead to just two at 19-17 with 6:27 to play in the half.
Brittany Waters then went back to work, scoring the next five Demon Deacon points to push the lead back out to seven and then junior Secily Ray added a lay-in to once again give the Deacs a nine-point edge at 26-17 with 4:40 left. A pair of Mustang three-pointers would help bring SMU to within six but Lindsy Wright and Ray scored on back-to-back lay-ins to give Wake its biggest lead of the half at 33-23.
The Deacons headed into the locker room with a nine-point edge, 33-24, thanks to 15 first-half points by Waters. She was 6-of-12 from the floor and had a season-high five steals. Garcia also played a solid first half, finishing six points on 3-of-3 from the floor.
SMU opened the second half with a three-pointer but the Deacons would also find their stroke from distance. Wake hit three of their first four three-point attempts in the second half, including back-to-back threes from Douglas and Garcia to take a 48-34 lead with 13:42 to play.
The Mustangs countered with a 14-2 run to climb back to within seven at 50-43 with 11:01 to play but that would be the last field goal for either team in almost six minutes. Boykin knocked-down a free throw at the 8:26 mark and Thomas would end the drought with a baseline jumper with 5:26 to play to put the Deacons ahead 53-43.
One minute later, Wills made one of two free throws to cut the lead to seven but that was as close as SMU would get the rest of the way as Wake ended the game on a 13-3 run. Waters had six points in the closing three minutes while Boykin added four.
After shooting just 36 percent in the first half, the Deacons shot 50 percent (13-of-26) in the second half to finish the game at 41.5 percent (27-of-65). Wake's pressure inside stymied SMU into shooting just 28.3 percent (17-of-60) for the game which was its lowest shooting percentage since the opening game of the season.
The Deacons also finished the game with a season-high 11 blocked-shots. Ray led the Wake charge with a career-high tying four blocks on the night.
Wake Forest will round-out the non-conference portion of its schedule on Thursday as it hosts Hampton at 7 p.m. at the Joel Coliseum. That game will be the final tune-up for the Deacs before embarking on ACC-play one week from tonight at NC State.
