The women's basketball team got the holiday season off to a goodstart. After starting the season 0-2, the team won all three oftheir games over the break to get above the five hundred mark.
The team got their first win of the season against IPFW onTuesday night in Memorial Coliseum in Fort Wayne. After a 2-2 tiewas broke in the early minutes, the Cardinals would not look back,leading the rest of the way to the final 93-75 win.
Behind senior Johna Goff's 16 points and the team shooting 51percent from the floor in the first half, the Cardinals took a54-38 lead into the break. In the second half the Cardinals kept uptheir pace and led by 24 at one point.
Goff finished with 21 points and eight assists, including threetreys and a perfect 10 of 10 from the free throw line.
Rebounding has been a key for the team so far this year and theydominated the boards, out rebounding IPFW 51-35. Senior JessicaReiter led the team in rebounds with 15, making it her thirdstraight game in which she had double figure rebounding.
The game was also a coming out for freshman Tina Bolte andKelsey Corbin. For Corbin who played high school ball at Northrop,the game was a homecoming and an impressive one with her 10-pointperformance off of 16 minutes. Bolte played 15 minutes and scoredeight points.
"We all know what Kelsey and Tina can do, we see them everydayat practice," head coach Tracy Roller said. "I guess probably as afan standpoint, it definitely was their coming out."
All 11 players for the Cardinals saw double figure minutes withthree scoring in double figures and four others with eight points.Kate Endress was the other scorer in double figures with 12 andRaechelle Hampton, Julie Just and Leah Boehme all scored eight.
"I think our bench play tonight, definitely won the game forus," Roller said.
The team then traveled to the East Carolina Thanksgivingtournament where they started off against Eastern Washington Eaglesin a game that was the tail of two halves. The Cardinals shot 54percent from the field in the first half while the Eagles shot only18 percent allowing Ball State to take a 34-16 lead intohalftime.
In the second half the Cardinals were the ones that had troublehitting their shots, shooting only 30 percent from the floor whilethe Eagles shot 63 percent. The Eagles outscored the Cardinals44-30 in the second half, but the Cardinals held on for the 64-60win.
The Cardinals then faced the Eastern Carolina Lady Pirates inthe championship, and this time they would not go cold, shooting 52percent from the floor and having five players score indouble-figures on the way to the 81-78 win. Endress led the scoringwith her 20 points and Goff had 14. Just, Boehme and Reiter allscored 11 with Boehme's being a career high for her.
After a close first half in which Ball State took a 42-38 leadinto halftime, the Cardinals did lead by 10 at one point in thesecond half, but with 20.7 seconds left they only had a three-pointlead. At 11.7 Endress missed the first of a one-and-one opportunitygiving the Lady Pirates a last second chance, but one they couldnot finish, giving the Cardinals the 81-78 win.
"Overall our execution was good," Roller said. "It was likeevery game this weekend someone would step up for us."
Ball State was led at the tournament by Goff and Endress andtheir work paid off. Endress was named the Tournament MVP afterscoring 41 and getting 12 rebounds. Goff was named to theAll-Tournament team after her performance of 31 points.
"(The first) weekend really hit home for me what my job on thisteam really is and I learned that I don't have to come out and tryand score 20 points a game, I got people like Kate Endress andJessica Reiter that are going to pick up the slack, I just got tobe a leader," Goff said. "I just came out and tried to be emotionaland get this team going."
"Just from a team standpoint we needed a win," Roller said. "Weknow (the first) weekend was a disappointment for us, and we try tolet it go, but nobody likes to lose."
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