Lady Raiders thump Troy

The Lady Raiders basketball team is getting into the habit of setting records at home.

For the second-straight Wednesday night at Murphy Center, a Lady Raider set a single-game team record with Kortni Jones' 16 assists as MT stifled Troy, 82-52.

A week ago, Ebony Roe set a record with perfect shooting–13-13 from the field–but this time Jones set the record with penetrating passes and quality playmaking.

"When Kortni Jones comes to play we're a pretty-good basketball team," said Coach Rick Insell. "For the last two or three games she's tried her best to get on track and do what I want done."

Finding fault with Jones' stat line is indeed difficult. In addition to the record 16 assists, Jones dropped in 24 points, including 6-14 from 3-point range, and collected four steals while committing just two turnovers.

Icelyn Elie and Roe were most rewarded by Jones' hot hand, as the two post players scored in double figures with Elie collecting 17 points, and Roe 12. Elie also hauled in 10 rebounds for a double and fellow starter Laken Leonard knocked down three from beyond the arc for 9 points.

"Ice is extremely athletic, and so is Ebony," Jones said. "If I see them out of the corner of my eye, and I'm a little bit ahead of them and I feel they are running 100 percent down the floor, nine times out of ten I'm going to throw it, and I think they'll eventually get to where the pass is going."

Jones' highlight night keynoted something of a statement victory for MT (17-5, 9-0 Sun Belt.) In contrast to the Jan. 5 game at Troy, when the Lady Raiders needed overtime to squeak out a six-point victory over the Trojans (1-18, 0-8 Sun Belt), the home tilt was clearly in MT's favor from start to finish.

MT scored the first five points of the contest and led by as many as 19 in the first half.

Troyshot 55 percent from the field in the first half, but the suffocating Raider press created a sharp disparity in shot attempts. Troy got off just 20 shots to MT's 32. Combine seven MT-made 3-pointers with 13 Troy turnovers, and the result was lethal as MT ended the half up 42-27.

The second half featured a similar theme as MT shot 17-35 and Troy just 7-19, while committing 13 more turnovers.

The closest Troy came in the second half was 13, at 44-31, before MT raddled off 13 straight to put the game out of reach for the duration.

Insell used the comfortable margin to help acclimate parts of his seldom-used bench to game action. Every Lady Raider on the bench played at least one minute.

Fan favorite Molly McFadden saw playing time in the first half and finished the night with seven minutes.

Guard Janay Brinkley contributed seven points in 18 minutes, substituting for Leonard and Shanice Cason.

Lauren March played 14 minutes, while Stephanie Myers, MiMi Ajanaku and Dymon Raynor all played two minutes or less.

"We've got some very talented young players that haven't broken out of their shells yet," Insell said. "We've got to bring them around. We're going to have to have them down the stretch."

The Lady Raiders will take the weekend off before a two-game trip to North Texas and Denver on Feb. 2 and 4.