By Jonathan Zenk, Northwestern State Assistant Director of Communications; featured photo by Chris Reich, NSU Photographic Services
CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas—People might as well call the fourth quarter, “Mya Time.”
Fresh off being named Southland Conference Player of the Week, Mya Blake scored 15 of her game-high 17 in the final period to lift Northwestern State (7-7, 4-1) to a 46-42 slugfest road victory against Texas A&M-Corpus Christi (9-6, 1-3) on Thursday evening at the Dugan Wellness Center.
The win snapped an 11-game winning streak for the Islanders in the series and first triumph in Corpus Christi in 11 years.
More importantly, this is the first four-game winning streak in SLC play since 2015-16 when the Demons finished the regular season with seven consecutive victories. Coincidentally, this is also the last season Northwestern State started 4-1 in league play.
“This was an incredible team win. I have way too much to share about how proud I am of this group, so I will keep this short. Players made BIG plays. Players believed through adversity. Players were tough and together.”
Down 24-19 entering the final quarter, Blake scored the first six points for the Demons to cut the deficit to 26-25 two minutes into the game to put the visitors right back in the game.
Led by Blake, the Demons embarked on a 12-2 run to turn a 29-27 deficit to a 40-32 lead. She either scored or assisted on 10 of the 12 points, scoring four and assisting on a pair of Sharna Ayres 3-pointers.
Overall, Blake either scored or assisted on 21 of the Demons 27 fourth quarter points.
She even came up with a block with less than a minute to go to keep Northwestern State in front 43-37.
The Islanders, the reigning SLC Tournament champions, cut it to 44-42 with eight seconds to play, but Jasmin Dixon came up huge with a pair of free throws to ice the Demons win.
Those were Dixon’s only two points of the game, but perhaps were the biggest. She contributed to the dominant Demons defensive performance with three rejections, moving her closer to the top five in program history in the category with 126, 13 behind Courtney Shead for fifth.
Northwestern State’s 27 points are more than it scored in the first three quarters combined when it scored 19.
Freshman Vernell Atamah scored the other four points of the final quarter for the Demons, as she recorded her first career double-double, scoring 13 points and a career-high 12 rebounds, five of which were offensive.
While the offenses caught fire in the fourth quarter, it was quite the opposite at the start of the game.
The teams combined to shoot 7-for-54 in the first half and the Demons held a 9-8 lead at the end of the half. Northwestern State shot just 3-of-29 for just 10.3 percent, but still held the lead, thanks to Nia Hardison scoring all five of her points.
Northwestern State shot 28 percent overall in the game, compared to AMCC’s 32 percent. In the fourth, though, the Demons made 8-of-12 shot attempts to come away with the win.
Free throws had a big impact on the game, as the Demons went 11-of-12 from the charity stripe, including 7-of-8 in the decisive fourth quarter, while the Islanders made just 6-of-14 shots from the free throw line, including missing all six attempts in the first half.
Mireia Aguado led the Islanders with 14 points on 5-of-8 shooting. Annukka Willstedt scored 11 points, including making three triples.
Paige Allen nearly posted a double-double for AMCC, but finished one point shy, scoring nine points and grabbing a team-high 11 boards.
The Demons are right back at home for a pair of games up next, starting with a visit from New Orleans on Thursday.