JEFFERSON CITY, Tenn. – A 27-3 first half run helped the No. 18 Carson-Newman Lady Eagles (5-0, 3-0 South Atlantic Conference) to an 80-69 victory over the Mars Hill Lions (2-3, 1-2 SAC) Tuesday night at Holt Fieldhouse.
"You have to be happy with a win," head coach Mike Mincey said. "I was really happy obviously with how we came out and performed early. The one thing that helped was our press. We feel like we have a lot of depth on this team and we are going to use a lot of people."
With Carson-Newman clinging to a 13-10 lead with 12:26 remaining in the first half, the Lady Eagles went on a 27-3 run that saw the home team make 14-of-15 field goals to jump out to a 40-13 advantage with 5:11 to play in the opening stanza.
The Lions finished the opening frame on a 10-2 run to make the halftime score 42-25 as the teams went to the locker room. Carson-Newman shot 55 percent from the floor while holding Mars Hill to 26 percent. Freshman forward Jecca Simerly (Talbott, Tenn.) went 7-for-10 from the floor as she led the way with 14 points and four rebounds.
Carson-Newman led by double figures nearly the entire second half with the exception of a few spurts that cut the lead to as few as eight points. The reason why the Lions kept the score close was free throw attempts as they shot 20 in the second half while going 21-of-31 in the game.
Senior forward Whitney Kyle (Jefferson City, Tenn.) poured in a career-high 15 points including a three-point play with 38 seconds to give the Lady Eagles the decisive 80-69 victory.
"They were a little bit smaller than us so we tried to pound it inside," Kyle said. "We tried to get it to our bigs and a smaller girl was guarding me so we just posted up whoever we could that helped us get in there and go one-on-one."
Junior guard Tatum Burstrom (Maryville, Tenn.) went 5-for-7 from three-point range in the second half as she finished with a season-high 20 points on 6-of-11 shooting from beyond the arc to lead all scorers in the game.
"Once again, who are going to pick on our team?" Mincey said. "We have so many different people that can always step up. Whitney was somebody that we needed to do it tonight. She had to guard No. 23 tonight and did a good job on here. If we can get more like that from Whitney that will make our team ever more complete."
Camille Glymph led the Lions with 19 points, four rebounds and four assists while Genice Lane had a double-double with 12 points and 13 rebounds for Mars Hill.
Carson-Newman is back in action Saturday afternoon at 2 p.m. when the North Greenville Crusaders come to Holt Fieldhouse.
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