The No. 14 MSU Lady Bulldogs closed out their pre-SEC schedule Monday night with a convincing 72-50 win over visiting University of Alabama at Birmingham. The win marked the first win for the Lady Bulldogs in the last four meetings between the border rivals.
“That was something that was on our minds. We remembered last year,” MSU sophomore guard Tan White said. “We didn’t come out with the intensity we needed in the first half, but in the second half we really got into our game.”
White and Renea Jones led the Bulldogs against the Blazers with 15 points apiece. To go along with her career-high in points, Jones added six assists, four steals and three rebounds. White hit 3-of-6 from behind the three-point arc to go with two assists, five rebounds, six steals and a block.
LaToya Thomas added 13 points and five rebounds for the Lady Bulldogs. Seneca Anderson added eight points and led the team in rebounds with six, and Mamie McKinney pitched in six points.
“We have seen some good things with our younger players during this early stretch,” head coach Sharron Fanning said. “We have ‘Toya (Thomas), and the rest of those kids are freshmen and sophomores down low. Those players are coming along.”
With the win, MSU ran their record to 11-2 going into the grueling SEC schedule. The Lady Bulldogs had won six straight contests before taking on the University of Utah in Missoula, Mont., in the Lady Griz Holiday Classic. After the heartbreaking lose, MSU has won three straight games going into last night against South Carolina in the SEC opener.
During the holidays, the Lady Bulldogs stayed on the road for seven consecutive games, ending the road swing with a 6-1 record. For their return to The Hump, MSU took on Xavier on Jan. 2.
The Lady Bulldogs also claimed the Lady Griz Holiday Classic championship during their holiday schedule as well as defeating Memphis, Illinois, Bethune-Cookman, Central Florida and Texas Pan-American.