NEW ORLEANS, Louisiana — Heading into a brief holiday break followed by the start of conference play, the Little Rock women's basketball team couldn't ask for a better time to grab a win, which they did Thursday with a 63-52 passing of Duquesne in the final day of the Tulane Holiday Tournament.
Little Rock (1-10) snapped a 10-game losing streak and also notched the 500
th victory in women's program history in the first-ever meeting against the Dukes (6-6). It was also the first win for the Trojans inside Fogelman Arena. The Trojans will have a week off before starting their OVC schedule with road games Dec. 28 at Tennessee Tech and Dec. 30 at Tennessee State. Little Rock's next home date is Jan. 4 against SIUE.
Faith Lee led all scorers with 18 points on 8-of-13 shooting,
Jayla Brooks dropped in a dozen points and grabbed six rebounds,
Leilani Wimbish-Gay had 11 points and
Sug Williams came off the bench to score 11 points and grab five rebounds.
Jaiyah Harris-Smith added nine rebounds, eight assists and six points. Lee was named to the All-Tournament Team.
Little Rock trailed by three after the first period but trimmed that deficit to a single point at halftime. In the second half, the Trojans shot 50 percent (14-of-28) from the field and outscored the Dukes by a 22-12 margin in the third and 16-14 in the fourth. The Trojans led by as many as 14 with just a minute to play and the game featured a total of seven lead changes. Little Rock outrebounded Duquesne 35-29, finished plus-4 in the turnover category and scored 16 points off 17 Duquesne miscues. Little Rock also limited the Dukes to just 48 field goal attempts and took 10 more shots than Duquesne.
Gabby Grantham-Medley led the Dukes with 15 points off the bench, Naelle Bernard added 12 and Megan McConnell had 12 points and nine rebounds. The Dukes shot 41.7 percent (20-of-48) for the game.
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