By RICK PETERSON
TopSports.news
Washburn University women's basketball complimented a hot-shooting second quarter with a balanced offensive attack in Friday's 80-64 romp past McKendree University in the first game of the Hansen Spear Funeral Home Classic.
Washburn's women's basketball team celebrates a Ichabod basket in Friday's 80-64 win over McKendree in Quincy, Ill. [Photo by Quincy Athletic Communications]
The Ichabods, who improved to 2-1, face the host Quincy Owls at 3 p.m. Saturday.
Washburn trailed by as many as three points in the first quarter where the Bearcats (1-2) shot 50 percent and knocked down two 3-pointers, but Yibari Nwidadah scored the last basket of the quarter to pull the Ichabods within one at 16-15.
Nwidadah started a 7-0 run for Washburn in the second quarter to go up by six and Aubree Dewey pushed the lead to nine at the 5:27 mark with a driving layup to make it a 29-20 game.
The Ichabod lead grew to 11 on an Amaya Davison layup with 2:08 left before halftime as Washburn kept scoring, hitting 11 of 17 field goals (64.7 percent) in the quarter. McKendree got a bucket just before the break to make it 39-30 at the half.
The Bearcats started out the third quarter on a 6-2 run, cutting the lead to five points, but a pair of buckets by Aniah Wayne midway through the quarter helped WU regain control and McKendree never got closer the rest of the way.
Both teams shot over 40 percent from the floor in the third quarter that ended with Washburn holding a 59-49 lead over the Bearcats.
After McKendree got the lead down to eight points, Wayne responded again with a 3-pointer off an assist from Dewey to go back up by 11 with 8:06 to go.
The deficit never shrunk below nine the rest of the way and grew to a game-high 16 points with 2:11 to go on a layup by Nwidadah. She knocked down a pair of free throws with one minute remaining to finish up the scoring in Washburn's 16-point win.
The Ichabods shot 46.4 percent from the floor and were 7 of 17 (41.2 percent) from 3-point range in their highest scoring game of the season.
McKendree was efficient from the floor (44.4 percent) but the Bearcats commited 15 turnovers, compared to just seven by Washburn.
Washburn had 10 players crack the scoring column and seven scored at least eight points. The Ichabod bench accounted for 35 points, outscoring the Bearcat bench by 18 points.
Wayne led Washburn with 16 points on 6 of 10 shooting and hit 4 of 6 from 3-pointers.
Nwidadah had 10 points with five rebounds in just 14 minutes due to foul trouble. Liz Boyd scored a career-high 11 points on 5 of 8 shooting and Dewey tied a career-high with nine assists and added eight points.
McKendree's Clare Breden led all scorers with 17 points while Naomi McDaniel had 15 points and 10 rebounds for a double-double.
