In the Zone
January 16, 2007 09:48 PM | General
January 16, 2007
BOX SCORE | PHOTO GALLERY
MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – LaQuita Owens scored 20 points and Olayinka Sanni added 17 points and 13 rebounds to lead West Virginia to a 79-54 victory over Seton Hall Tuesday night at the WVU Coliseum.
 |
||
| Lateefah Joye drives for two of her career-high 12 points for West Virginia Tuesday night against Seton Hall.
All-Pro Photography/Dale Sparks |
The victory was West Virginia’s third straight over a team with a winning record and boosts the Mountaineers’ overall record to 11-7. West Virginia also evened its Big East mark to 3-3.
“We need every win we can get right now,” said West Virginia coach Mike Carey.
The Mountaineers decided to use a zone defense against Seton Hall, which came into the game shooting just 19.7 percent from 3-point range.
“Viewing tapes of Seton Hall we felt we could do that,” said Carey of his decision to play mostly zone. “I just wanted to show them man a couple of times and stick with the zone.
"They had three players in the lineup at the start of the game that had never tried a 3,” Carey said.
West Virginia used a 20-2 run to build a 29-11 lead with 10 minutes left in the first half. Three straight 3s by Owens, Sparkle Davis and Chakhia Cole built the lead to 13, and another 3 by Owens gave the Mountaineers a 16-point advantage with 10:29 remaining.
Lateefah Joye punctuated the run with an athletic, double-clutching drive to the basket.
“Lateefah Joye came off the bench and gave us a spark,” said Carey.
Seton Hall closed out the first half with a run of its own, scoring 11 straight and holding West Virginia scoreless for the remaining 5:34.
“I thought the last five minutes of the first half we stopped executing,” Carey said. “That stretch when they made that run how many easy shots did we miss in the post?”
The second half West Virginia quickly got the lead back to double digits and led by 22 with 7:54 to go. West Virginia’s biggest lead was 25 – the game’s final margin.
“They went in that 1-3-1 in that and we didn’t execute in it. I thought the second half we executed a lot better and we took them out of it and forced them to play a soft man-to-man,” Carey said.
Joye came off the bench to score a career-high 12 and Cole added 11 points. For Sanni, it was her ninth career double-double.
Sparkle Davis, hobbled by a sprained ankle, managed to score 9 points in 24 minutes of action.
“As everybody saw they were backing off our point guards and Sparkle came in and made them play more straight-up,” said Carey.
“I thought she showed a lot of guts coming out tonight. We didn’t even practice her yesterday. When I saw them backing off us I told Sparkle, ‘You’ve got to go,’” Carey said.
Seton Hall (9-8, 1-5) got 11 points each from Heta Korpivaara and Brittney Messina.
West Virginia has a key Big East game coming up this Saturday against Villanova at the WVU Coliseum. On Jan. 6, West Virginia blew a five-point lead with 47 seconds to go and lost 70-64 to the Wildcats in double overtime.
Saturday’s game is scheduled to tip at noon.
“I like where we’re at right now,” Carey said. “I think we’re playing with a lot more confidence.”
