Lady Knights rebound with victory over Winston-Salem State

LAURINBURG — The St. Andrews Knights women’s basketball team picked up a 50-45 victory over the Winston-Salem State Rams on Monday night at Harris Court. The Knights improve to 7-10 (3-7 against conference opponents) on the season with the victory while Winston-Salem State falls to 3-10 (0-4 in conference games) with the loss. Coming off of a 41-point defeat at the hands of Johnson on Thursday afternoon, Head Coach Denise Hannah was focused on turning the page to Monday’s contest but was aware of the improvement that was necessary and kept the message to her team simple: use it as an opportunity to learn and get better.

“We can’t change the outcome, all we can do is grow from it and correct the things we consistently aren’t doing well,” Hannah said. “We can’t pick and choose when we want to play, it should be consistent across the board every single night.”

St. Andrews got off to a good start, scoring the first six points of the game over the first 3:15 of action. The Rams didn’t score their first points of the contest until Jakaiya Mack made a layup after four minutes had already passed. The Knights controlled the quarter from start to finish and ended it with a made jump shot by Angelina Jordan as St. Andrews held a 16-5 advantage after 10 minutes.

With the lopsided defeat the team was coming off of, a good start was vital to Hannah. She wanted them to establish momentum early and set the tone for the rest of the game, which she feels like they were able to do.

“That was my message pregame,” Hannah said. “When we get a lead, put our foot down. They stayed true to what we practiced and the film we saw.”

Jordan made another jump shot after one minute and six seconds passed in the second frame to extend the St. Andrews lead up to 18-5, their largest advantage of the game. However, the Rams responded with 10 unanswered points in 2.5 minutes to trim the gap to three (18-15). Despite losing the quarter 18-11, the Knights would go into the locker room up 27-23 at halftime.

Unfortunately for St. Andrews, the slump continued into the third period as Winston-Salem State scored six straight points to start the second half and found themselves suddenly up by seven (36-29, their largest lead of the contest) with 5:15 left in the quarter. However, the Knights were able to close out the rest of the third quarter on a 6-2 run that made the score 38-35 in favor of the Rams after 30 minutes of action.

Even though the start of the second half was not good for St. Andrews, Hannah was pleased to see her team remain composed and fight through the runs the Rams went on. She mentioned that runs are part of the game but that the response if often what determines the outcome of games.

“That was one of my messages at halftime, they’re going to come out in the third quarter and give us a fight,” Hannah said. “Basketball is a game of runs, it’s how you respond when a team goes on a run. There’s no six point play or seven point play, you just have to chip away.”

Londaisha Smith knocked down a three-pointer just over a minute into the final frame that evened the score at 38. The teams would then eventually remain deadlocked in a 40-40 tie for over three minutes before Chloe Williams knocked down two important free throws with 1:45 left in the game to give Winston-Salem State a 42-40 lead. The Knights then took control of the game with six unanswered points in the next 45 seconds and saw Jamicia Davis make three free throws while also grabbing her own miss that allowed the Knights to dribble the final 11 seconds off the clock.

Davis led St. Andrews in scoring with 11 points and in assists with eight while also having six rebounds and two steals in the team’s victory. AJ Price paced the Knights in rebounds with 10 while also scoring eight points while dishing out one assist.

St. Andrews had a few key areas of statistical advantage. They were better than the Rams from the field (33.9%-30%), from the three-point line (22.2%-17.4%), committed fewer turnovers (17-24) and scored more points off turnovers (19-17).

The Knights will be back in action on Wednesday night as they will travel to face conference rival Truett-McConnell. Tipoff is scheduled for 5:30 p.m.

With where the two teams sit in the conference standings (Truett-McConnell is currently in a tie for seventh while St. Andrews is in 10th), Hannah knows the importance of their upcoming conference games. The Knights will have a lot of opportunities to collect some valuable victories, though Hannah wants the focus to remain in the present for the time being.

“We talked about that in postgame,” Hannah said. “We know what’s at stake, we have a good opportunity the rest of the month to climb in the rankings but we’re just taking it one game at a time.”