#9 Wayne State 75 Augustana College 55
#9 Wayne State College snapped Augustana's 18-game home court winning streak in convincing fashion Saturday afternoon with a 75-55 win over the Vikings in Northern Sun Conference women's basketball played at the Elmen Center in Sioux Falls, South Dakota. Junior forward Ashley Arlen scored a game-high 25 points for the Wildcats and became the 15th player in WSC women's basketball history to surpass the 1,000 point mark, now with 1,001 in her second season with the Wildcats. With the win, WSC is now 22-2 overall and 19-1 in the NSIC while Augustana, suffering its first home loss since January 9, 2010, falls to 18-9 overall and 11-9 in conference play.
The Wildcats jumped out to an early 12-4 lead in the first four minutes of the game following an Alyssa Fischbach three pointer. After WSC took a 15-7 lead, the host Vikings scored eight straight points and tied the score at 15-15 on a three pointer from Kristi Board with 11:53 to play in the half. The Vikings continued their momentum and took a 20-17 lead with 8:30 remaining in the first half on a Megan Doyle jumper.
But WSC came back with a 12-1 run over the next 5:24 to take the lead for good. Mara Hjelle's three point play with 6:15 to play in the half put WSC in front to stay at 22-20. The Wildcats closed the first half strong thanks to strong bench play and used a pair of three pointers and a basket from Renee Wood and a pair of baskets from Alisha Wood to take a 38-27 lead at halftime.
WSC opened the second half on a mission and took a 14 point lead at 47-33 on a Clare Duwelius three pointer with 16:33 to go in the game. Augustana got as close as eight points at 47-39 on a Megan Doyle three pointer at the 15:34 mark, but WSC responded by scoring the next 11 points to take a commanding 58-39 lead with 12:43 to play and the Wildcats never looked back.
The story of the game in the second half was Wayne State's Ashley Arlen, who scored 16 of her game-high 25 points in the second stanza and hit a Wildcat milestone by sinking a three pointer with 4:41 to play to break the 1,000 point mark. She now has 1,001 points in just her second season as a Wildcat. WSC took their biggest lead of the night (23 points) at 74-51 with 2:21 remaining on an Alisha Brown three pointer and the Wildcats went on to hand Augustana their first home loss since January 9, 2010 with the dominant 75-55 win over the Vikings.
Arlen finished the night with a game-high 25 points, making 9 of 17 shots from the field, 3 for 4 behind the three point line and 4 of 4 at the free throw stripe. Senior Alyssa Fischbach added 10 points and 10 rebounds for her second double-double of the season. Mara Hjelle contributed nine points and nine rebounds and moved into 10th place on the all-time WSC scoring list with 1,237 points, surpassing Krista Bernadt's 1,232 career points (1997-2001) for 10th place on the Wildcat scoring list. Wayne State shot 53.7 percent from the field, making 29 of 54 shots including 9 of 14 three pointers (64.3%). The 'Cats were 8 for 10 at the free throw stripe.
Augustana College was led by Megan Doyle with 14 points and four assists. Molly Hayes added 13 points followed by Alex Feeney and Kristi Board with 11 and 10 points respectively. The Vikings made just 22 of 61 shots from the field for 36.1 percent. Augustana was 8 of 24 from the three point line and just 3 of 4 at the charity stripe.
Wayne State dominated the boards as the Wildcats grabbed 35 rebounds compared to 28 for Augustana. Fischbach led all rebounders with 10 rebounds for WSC while Augustana's Megan Doyle had nine to lead the Vikings.
It was just the second win in 11 tries for Wayne State College at Augustana with the other win coming in the 2007-08 season for the Wildcats over the Vikings in Sioux Falls.
Wayne State will be wrap up the regular season at home next weekend, hosting Minnesota, Crookston Friday evening at 6:00 p.m. and MSU Moorhead Saturday in a 4:00 p.m. game at Rice Auditorium in Wayne.
