Not in our house
Even with 20 turnovers, JMU wins by 22
By Brian Hansen, sports editor
Posted on February 12, 2007

Northeastern University (3-21 overall, 2-11 in the Colonial Athletic Association) jumped all over JMU (22-2, 13-0) to take an early 4-0 lead.

That was about as close as the Huskies would get as Madison scored the next seven points and didn’t look back the rest of the way, winning 85-63 at home Sunday.

“You feel spoiled sometimes, because a lot of teams in the country would love a 22-point victory,” JMU coach Kenny Brooks said. “We understand, though, that we still have some work to do.”

Junior forward Tamera Young led four Dukes in double figures with 23. Senior center Meredith Alexis had 21, senior forward Shirley McCall had 14, and junior forward Jennifer Brown came off the bench to score a season-high 14 points. As a team, the Dukes shot 58.5 percent from the field.

“I felt like it was an OK game,” McCall said. “We had our highs and lows and played a little flat in the first half. We just had to do what we usually do and execute.”

Alexis’ 21 points leave her just 10 points shy of becoming JMU’s all-time leading scorer. Holly Rilinger, who played for the Dukes from 1992-97, holds the record of 1,607 points.

“I think it would be more exciting if she didn’t have so many records already,” Brooks. “But I guess this is kind of like the grandmother of them all.”

Alexis, who already is the Dukes all-time leading rebounder, also grabbed a game-high 17 rebounds for JMU.

Madison didn’t play its perfect game, though, as the team turned the ball over 20 times to help keep the Huskies in the game longer than expected.

“It’s frustrating to have them turn the ball over 20 times and not get better results from it,” Northeastern coach Daynia La-Force Mann said. “But if you look at every other category, I mean they outrebounded and they hit key shots at key times.”

JMU held the rebounding advantage 48-22, including 16-7 on offensive boards and doubled up the Huskies in assists 22-11.

Senior point guard Andrea Benvenuto had 11 assists to lead the Dukes in that category.

Point guard Lucia Pablos led the Huskies with 20 points, seven rebounds and four assists.

“I thought Northeastern got some situations where they really played to their advantages,” Brooks said. “There were a couple of miscommunications that led to some breakdowns defensively, but for the most part we played pretty well.”