Women's basketball team wins, advances to quarterfinals
The Eastern Florida State College women's basketball team advanced to the quarterfinals of the NJCAA Division I National Tournament for the second straight year on Thursday night.
The Titans, who are the No. 2 seed in the tournament, defeated No. 18 Walters State College 73-45 at Rip Griffin Center at Lubbock Christian University in Texas.
Eastern Florida State College got off to a slow start, but got things going late in the first quarter as Leilani Guion hit a 3-pointer and Isimenme Ozzy-Momodu would make a basket to give the Titans their first lead. They would lose the lead again for a few moments, but the Titans finished with seven straight points before a Walters State 3-pointer to end the first quarter.
"It is hard to just jumpstart and we took a moment to get warmed up and going but once we got settled into the game, we were OK but I think we just had some nerves," Eastern Florida State College women's basketball coach MJ Baker said.
Up 18-15, the Titans took over the game in the second quarter as they would build the lead to 10 points on a couple of free throws by Amelia Hassett with 4:21 left in the second quarter gave the Titans a 32-22 lead. From there the defense began making a difference as Walters State failed to get a shot off twice and the Titans would outscore Walters State 24-13 in the quarter to take a 15-point lead into halftime.
L'or Eyeba Mputu would score six quick points early in the third quarter and the Titans never looked back.
Ozzy-Momodu finished with 16 points and six rebounds while teammate Mputu had 14 and five rebounds. Elli Garnett had a big all-around game with 13 points, nine rebounds and seven assists.
The win was the 32nd of the season for the Titans who will play No. 7 Wabash Valley in the national tournament quarterfinals Saturday at 4 p.m. EDT.