Box Score FINAL BOX


Freshmen Kierra Paige scored 15 points, while teammate guard Danielle Gazaway added 13 points but it wasn't enough as the Alabama State women's basketball team dropped a 62-51 decision to Samford on Wednesday evening at the Dunn-Oliver Acadome. 
 
“Any time that you lose at home you're going to be disappointed,” Head Women's Basketball Coach Freda Freeman-Jackson stated.  “You always want to protect your home court and come up with the victory.  I thought Samford had a good team they are senior oriented so they executed the ball really well tonight and came up with the win.”
 
With the loss, ASU slips to a 0-2 start on the season while Samford improves to 2-1.  Paige's 15 points came on a 6-of-14 shooting, including 3-of-8 from deep.  Gazaway finished 5-of-17 from the floor with a pair of assists and three rebounds.
 
Senior Millicent Jones was a force down low, scoring seven points and hauling in eight rebounds in 12 minutes of action. 
 
In the first half of play the Bulldogs led by as many as 18 points, 37-19, ASU would then go on a 7-2 run to cut the lead to 13 at the half trailing 39-26.
 
“I felt like we dug a hole for ourselves in the first half,” said Freeman-Jackson “You are talking about 9-14 from the three-point line that's winning basketball and we didn't do a good job communicating allowing them to get out there and shoot.”
 
The second half saw a lot more improvement as the Lady Hornets took a defensive stance and only allowed the Bulldogs to shot 28.6 percent from the tip of the arc as a posed to the 64.3 percent they shot in the first half.  ASU still didn't capitalize on the missed shots allowing the Bulldogs to have second chances in the paint.  
 
“We missed a lot of shots that we should have made and didn't capitalize when we should have,” Freeman-Jackson stated.  If you look at the stats we out-scored Samford the second half.  In the end I do feel like our girls played really hard, and we knew that Samford was going to be a tough team to beat.  We are going to have to step our game up and find a way to finish games.”
 
Samford out-rebounded Alabama State by a 40-to-30 count and shot a solid 81 percent from the free stripe.  Selby Campbell of Samford led all scorers with 21 points.
 
Alabama State will be back in action on Monday, November 21 when the team travels to Thibodaux, La to face the Colonels of Nicholls State.  The game time is set for 2 p.m.