The Lady Panthers kept their energy high during the past two games as they protected the crib with a 71-38 victory over the Alabama State Lady Hornets and snatched a 73-47 win against the Alabama A&M Lady Bulldogs.
The Lady Panthers executed their pressing style of defense to perfection Saturday night as they forced the Lady Hornets of Alabama State into 18 turnovers to improve their conference record to 7-1 and to pull their overall record even at 10-10.
Prairie View jumped out the gate quickly with full court pressure creating easy buckets off ASU mistakes. Dominique Smith got into the action early and often, connecting on four out of five three-point field goals to end the day with a game and season high 31 points. Plenty of Lady Panthers got involved in the defensive scheme with point guard Shondria Combs grabbing two steals to go along with her nine points. Alabama State’s offensive attack was stifled by the Lady Panther defense during the first half, as the Lady Hornets could only muster up a mere 12 points to the home team’s 32. The second half didn’t prove to be much different as the Panthers outscored the Lady Hornets 41-26 to seize the easy win, 71-38.
Smith’s offensive performance led the Lady Panthers while Candice Thomas followed with 13 points. Gaati Werema, the hero of the 17-point comeback versus UAPB, ended the game with only five points, but snatched down 10 rebounds to help the Lady Panthers control the boards. Twila Stokes again led the team in rebounding (13) to help PVAMU out-rebound ASU, 48-28.
Monday also would prove to be another first half scuffle as the Lady Panthers increased their halftime lead, 35-25, to outscore the Lady Bulldogs 38-22 in the second half. The first-place Panthers again used a suffering defense which forced Alabama A&M into bad situations. Prairie View grabbed eight steals in the contest led by Thomas’ three rips, as she got into the passing lane for two run away lay-ups.
On offense, Thomas also led the team by example by knocking down 6-of-10 shots for a game high 17 points to go along with her five assists. The little guard who plays big, Shondria Combs, also got into the action scoring 14 points, dishing out three assists, and jumping to the tune of four rebounds. Werema continued to show her worth on the court against the Lady Bulldogs by putting in another double-double effort to give her two in the last three ballgames. Werema is second on the team averaging 10.9 points and 6.8 rebounds a game while Thomas leads the Lady Panthers with a 14.6 average against conference foes. They also lead the team in free-throw percentage shooting a combined 80 percent from the line versus SWAC opponents.
The Lady Panthers will now get prepared to continue their eight-game conference winning streak on the road against rival Texas Southern University. The game is scheduled for 5:30 p.m. in the H&PE Arena on the campus of TSU.