GREENEVILLE, Tenn. --- Blayre Shultz scored a career-high 28 points and Tusculum University held Mars Hill University to 24.1 percent shooting as the Pioneers defeated the Lions 82-44 in South Atlantic Conference women's basketball action Saturday afternoon at Pioneer Arena.
Jami Tham recorded her 16th straight double-double with 17 points and a game-high 14 rebounds, and Mya Belton added 11 points, 11 rebounds and five blocked shots for the Pioneers (14-2, 5-1 SAC), who bounced back from an overtime loss to Limestone on Wednesday by racing to a 14-point lead after one quarter in improving to 8-0 at home this season.
Tusculum outrebounded Mars Hill by a 53-33 margin and scored 25 points off 18 Lions turnovers. The Pioneers turned 15 offensive rebounds into 17 points and outscored the Lions 27-2 on fast-break points in their 12th straight win over Mars Hill and a sweep of the season series for the sixth year in a row.
Naja Ngongba led the Lions (3-9, 0-5 SAC) with 13 points and seven rebounds, Hannah Barr added 12 points and Janette Hanni scored 11 for Mars Hill, which shot 13-for-54 from the field and 2-for-19 from three-point range as a team. Mars Hill did go 16-for-21 from the foul line in the game, led by Hanni who was 7-for-9 at the stripe, but took its sixth consecutive loss.
Shultz shot 8-for-17 from the field, including 4-for-8 from three-point range, and went 8-for-9 from the foul line to surpass her previous high of 22 points achieved twice previously, most recently on Dec. 31 against Milligan. Tham was 8-for-12 from the field and made her only foul shot to extend her NCAA Division II lead in double-doubles to 16. Her 14 rebounds included six on the offensive glass and came in just 27 minutes due to second-half foul trouble.
Belton notched her sixth double-double of the season and her fourth in the last five games, while moving into third place on the program career blocked shot list with 126, passing Candice Combs who had 125 from 2001-03. Belton is 15 away from the school career record of 141 blocks set by Stephany Neptune from 2005-09, four rebounds shy of taking over 10th place on the program career list, and 47 points from becoming the 21st member of the Tusculum 1,000-point club.
Tusculum went up 5-0 on a putback by Tham and a three-pointer by Alyssa Walker in the first two minutes, before Mars Hill got on the board on a layup by Hanni with 7:55 left in the quarter. The Pioneers would stretch their lead to 17-6 on consecutive three-pointers by Shultz with 3:34 left in the quarter, and take a 21-6 lead on a layup by Deidre Cheremond with 1:40 to go. Hanni's layup would be the only field goal of the quarter for the Lions, who missed their final eight shots and trailed 21-7 after one period.
The Pioneers stretched their lead to 25-9 on a Tham layup with 6:32 left in the first half, and went up 30-14 on another three-pointer from Walker with 4:23 to go. Tham gave the Pioneers a 32-14 lead with 3:52 to play, but each team would miss six straight shots until a layup from Barr with 48 seconds remaining. Cheremond hit two free throws with 25 seconds left to send the Pioneers to the half with a 34-16 lead.
Shultz led all players with 12 points in the first half on 5-for-9 shooting while Tham had 10 points and a game-high nine boards. Tusculum shot 36.8 percent (14-for-38) from the field and went 4-for-15 from three-point range in the half while committing just four turnovers. Barr paced the Lions with five points in the half, but Mars Hill shot just 4-for-26 (15.4 percent) from the floor and surrendered 16 points off eight turnovers.
The Pioneers pushed their lead to 39-18 on a putback by Tham with 8:02 left in the third quarter, but went scoreless for nearly four minutes as the Lions came back within 39-23 on four points from Ngongba and a foul shot from Maddie Gillie. A steal and layup by Cheremond with 4:06 to go in the quarter triggered a 9-2 Tusculum run to end the quarter, as the Pioneers carried a 48-25 lead into the final period.
The fourth quarter would begin with a 16-2 Tusculum run which included seven points from Shultz and a pair of three-pointers by Belton, with a Cheremond layup giving the Pioneers a 65-27 lead with 6:09 to play. The Pioneers would build their lead to 42 points at 78-36 following a fast-break layup by Jenna Kallenberg with 1:37 left, and Tusculum closed the game with buckets from McKenna Myers and Delana DeBusk in the final minute.
Cheremond finished with 11 points and eight rebounds in 21 minutes off the bench for the Pioneers, while DeBusk had a season-high four rebounds along with two assists and two steals in 12 minutes. Tusculum's bench outscored the Mars Hill reserves by a 20-3 margin, through Kyla Daniels had seven rebounds in 26 minutes for the Lions.
Tusculum will travel to Carson-Newman to face the Eagles on Wednesday, Jan. 11 at 5:30 p.m. from Holt Fieldhouse for the first of two meetings this season. The Eagles improved to 9-6 overall and 4-2 in the SAC with a 59-45 win over Lincoln Memorial on Saturday. Carson-Newman has won six of its last eight games since Dec. 1 to take over second place in the Mountain Division of the SAC, one game behind Tusculum.
