LOS ANGELES, Calif. ? Over the first 11 minutes of the game between Indiana State and San Diego State, it appeared that Gersten Pavilion on the campus of Loyola Marymount might be witness to a shooting performance like the Lions' when they posted 181 points against US International in the highest scoring game in NCAA History (a 181-150 victory in 1989), but the defenses finally took control as the Sycamores walked away with a 75-68 victory over the Aztecs in the opening game of the LMU Ayers Holiday Tournament.
Indiana State improved to 3-0 on the season, while San Diego State fell to 3-1. ISU is 3-0 for the first time since the 2002-03 season, and have started the season with three consecutive victories for just the eighth time in the history of the program.
The Sycamores opened the game by hitting 7 of their first 8 attempts from long range.
Kelsey Luna got the Sycamores off on the right foot with the first three of her team-high 24 points just 24 seconds in as the Sycamores opened with a quick 5-0 advantage.
“I thought we played extremely well in the first half,” head coach Jim Wiedie said. “Considering the long day that we had yesterday with the travel and everything, we were able to take it right to San Diego State on both ends of the floor. We were aggressive on the offensive end, and we were able to jump out to an early lead.”
Leading 18-14 with 12:38 left in the first half, Rudolphi poured in a pair of her 19 points and then Schilli followed that up with a 3-pointer to make the score 25-14 with 10:12 left. ISU finished off a 10-0 run with another trifecta from Luna for a 28-14 lead.
“Luna played very well in the first half and was deadly from long range,” Wiedie commented. “She showed a lot of determination to get off some of those shots and they fell for us early.”
Indiana State scored the first half's final eight points, capped with a jumper from Angela Phillips at the 1:36 mark for a 45-27 lead.
San Diego State started a strong second half by scoring the first four points after intermission, but the Sycamores responded by taking its largest lead of the game, 54-35 with 14:04 left in the game on another triple by Luna.
“That run gave us a little bit of cushion against them,” Angela Phillips said. “But we struggled to keep the momentum going as they continued to pick up the intensity in the second half.”
Things would tense up a bit in the final minute of the game as SDSU's Jene Morris cut the Sycamore lead down to 70-64 with 1:06 left in the game, but Angela Phillips hit five free throw attempts in the final minute to secure a 75-68 victory.
San Diego State employed a tight full court press that put two of their tallest players on Angela Phillips who often used her own elusiveness and speed to get the Sycamores into their half court sets.
“(San Diego State) was a really good team and were very physical,” Phillips said after the game. “I am proud of the way we handled their pressure.”
Wiedie echoed Phillips' assessment after the game as well.
“Watching the game film coming in we knew they were a physical team and we would have to withstand their pressure the entire game,” Wiedie said. “We gave up some size to them across the board, so we had to be strong with the ball and execute our game plan in order to be successful.”
At the half, the Aztecs had forced just nine Sycamore turnovers and scored only four points off those miscues, but in the second half, ISU turned the ball over 11 more times for a total of 20 and San Diego State was able to score 17 points off those turnovers after the break to finish the game with 21 points off turnovers and 13 steals. Coming into the game, San Diego State had forced 101 opponent turnovers in three games and averaged just over 19 steals per game.
“Their trapping defense was really good, and they picked us up man-to-man several times in the second half,” Phillips said. “We were able to attack the basket and get to the free throw once we got passed it.”
Indiana State forced the Aztecs to get away from their strength in the game, 6-2 freshman Allison Duffy and 6-4 freshman Paris Johnson, by forcing them to take more shots from the perimeter. That worked well as Johnson scored 25 points, but could have had more if not for San Diego State falling into the Sycamore game plan and hitting just 4-of-24 3-pointers in the game.
“I thought for the most part we did a good job of executing the game plan and forcing them to take some long range jumpers and 3-pointers,” Wiedie commented. “I really wanted to see them take over 30 shots from the three, but we made them take enough outside shots and we were able to get key rebounds to make our plan effective.”
Indiana State will play again on Saturday, November 24 against the host Lions, beginning at 7 p.m. (EST). The game can be heard live locally on WISU-FM (89.7 FM) and on the internet at GoSycamores.com.
