With four ladies scoring in double-digits Sunday evening, the Lady Lions rolled past the NAIA member Spring Hill College 85-72 anchored by a strong second half.

Spring Hill got out to a fast and efficient start converting two three-pointers on their first two possessions, and after a layup from center April Bradford, Spring Hill led the Lady Lions 10-6 five minutes into the match. Spring Hill continued to knockdown shots as Lasheena Nation made her second three-pointer of the night with 13:42 left to play in the first half giving Spring Hill a 15-10 lead.

With the lead increasing, the Lady Lions started to claw back. The game saw its first tie at the 10:32 mark when freshman guard Symone Miller got a steal and converted the layup on the other end knotting the score 19-19.  

The two teams would continue to go back and forth as the first half saw five more tie scores, ending with the Lady Lions ahead 41-37. Spring Hill shot nearly 60-percent from the field and over 70-percent from three-point range.

“Spring Hill is a catch and shoot team, and we allowed the next pass to be open way too often and they got too many easy shots,” said Lady Lion head coach Lori Davis Jones.  

The Lady Lions would own the second half on both ends of the floor jumping out to a 46-41 lead after two consecutive layups by junior forward Aja Gibson who led all scorers on the night with 19 points.

“Our game plan going into tonight was the post is going to touch the ball or the ball is going into the paint before you can take a shot,” said Davis Jones. “By establishing that post game mentality it gave Aja more touches.”

 The Lady Lions got key contributions off the bench from guard Jessica Sommers and freshman guard Elizabeth Styles. Sommers went 4-for-6 from the field with 10 points in the second half, while Styles added seven points of 11 points in the second going 3-for-3 in the half. The Lady Lions produced 41 bench points compared to the Spring Hill’s 11.

“We feel like our bench is going to continue to give us a lot,” said Davis Jones. “We’ve got a lot of young players on our bench and they’re all players who can hit shots.”

As a team, the Lady Lions shot over 60-percent from the field while holding Spring Hill to just 37-percent.

“In the second half we went away from what we were doing in the first half and just went straight man-to-man defense,” said Davis Jones. “It seemed to work a little better.”