In the city of Motown, the Youngstown State Penguins women’s basketball team (15-7, 8-4 Horizon) were singing some pretty good tunes in their 69-53 road win over the Detroit Mercy Titans (4-17, 2-10 Horizon) on Dick Vitale Court at Calihan Hall.
It’s the second straight win for YSU, who are still tied in second place in the Horizon League with Purdue Fort Wayne. As for the last-place Titans, they have now dropped 10 in a row.
If you ever heard a Motown classic song called “I Wish It Would Rain” by The Temptations, this song would fit perfectly for what happened in this game. In the first half, YSU shot 64 percent (16-of-25) from the field and 61.5 percent (8-of-13) from three-point territory. Overall for the game, they shot 50 percent (23-of-46) on field goals and 42.9 percent (9-of-21) on three-pointers, as well as an outstanding 87.5 percent (14-of-16) at the free throw line.
It was definitely a “wham, bam, thank you Cam” type of evening for the Penguins as Danielle Cameron scored 17 of her career-high 19 points in the first half, with 11 of them coming in the second quarter. She also made five threes in 11 attempts.
“Dani [Cameron] is an unbelievable shooter, really good player,” Penguins head coach Melissa Jackson said about Cameron after the game. “Crazy that she’s only a redshirt freshman, right? But kudos to our offense. I thought our post players gave her some great kickouts. She was shot ready. Our ball movement in the first half was really, really good, and I think she was the beneficiary of a lot of that.”
Erica King scored 14 points of her own and hit a career-high four triples in as many attempts. Sophia Gregory scored 11 of her 13 points in the third quarter while pulling down eight rebounds and dishing out four assists. Sarah Baker scored 11 points on 4-of-7 shooting, while Paulina Hernandez recorded eight points off the bench.
Kiefer Haffey’s UDM squad shot a solid 71.4 percent from the foul line (10-of-14), but they also made just 30.3 percent (20-of-66) of their shots from the field and 13.6 percent (3-of-22) of their threes. Detroit Mercy won the battles in rebounding (41-32), bench points (32-10), and points in the paint (28-26).
Kailee Davis was the lone Titan that scored in double figures with 15 points off the bench, while Makayla Jackson finished with eight points and a game-high four steals. Davis and Jackson each played 32 minutes.
Detroit Mercy’s Naima Diawara scored the first bucket on a nine-foot jump shot just 20 seconds into the contest for UDM’s only lead of the night, but Youngstown State scored the next 13 unanswered points on back-to-back layups from Gregory and Baker, a Cameron three, a Casey Santoro layup, a pair of free throws from Baker, and a 13-foot jumper from King at the 4:39 mark.
Following a layup from UDM’s Jasmine Edwards that cut the deficit back to single digits at 13-4, YSU closed out the period on a 10-4 run that was keyed by a pair of triples by King before Hayden Barrier scored the last bucket of the first stanza to make it 23-8 with 41 seconds remaining.
In the 2nd quarter, YSU was up by as many as 21 following back-to-back triples from Cameron which made it 45-24 at the 1:20 mark. Addisen Mastriano then made a layup with 52 seconds to go to make it a 45-26 deficit at the half.
The Titans scored five of the first seven points in the third quarter with a Maya Anderson three and a two-point bucket from Davis to decrease the deficit to 16 at 47-31 at the 7:32 mark, but Gregory scored nine of the next 11 points by herself to increase Youngstown State’s lead to 23 at 56-33 with 3:25 to go. During that stretch, Gregory went on her own personal 7-0 run that lasted 2:55.
Hernandez then converted an old-fashioned three-point play to give YSU their largest lead of the night at 59-33 before Detroit Mercy scored the next six unanswered points within a 2:30 span, courtesy of a Nisea Burrell free throw and the next five points coming from Davis. Then Gregory made a layup with a dozen seconds to go before the period ended to make it a 22-point cushion at 61-39.
The Titans scored seven of the first 10 points of the fourth quarter to make it a 64-46 deficit and held YSU without a field goal halfway through the final stanza, with Anna Lassan scoring a pair of buckets in that stretch, but King ended that drought with a corner three to push the Penguins’ lead back up to 21 at 67-46 at the 4:36 mark. After Davis and Hernandez exchanged layups, UDM scored five straight points all on free throws – two from Burrell, one from Amaya Burch, and the final pair coming from Mastriano – to close out the scoring.
Up next: The Penguins will go for the Michigan road sweep as they visit Oakland on Saturday afternoon for a 2 p.m. tip-off at the OU Credit Union O’rena in Rochester, MI.
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