DEKALB, Ill - The tenth straight win for Ball State women’s basketball did not come easy. The first half was sluggish, but the Cardinals prevailed for another Mid-American Conference (MAC) win, and the 16th of the season.
The Cardinals found themselves behind with a two-point deficit at the end of the first quarter. They did not trail for long though. By the end of the half, they led by six.
The first half was slow on both ends of the floor, but after some halftime adjustments, head coach Brady Sallee thought his team put their pieces together for a complete game.
“Good win on the road,” Sallee said. “I thought after a little bit of a rock fight there in the first half, I thought we made some good adjustments with our press. We got a little bit more comfortable running offense, and I thought we dominated at the rim.”
The Cardinals shot just 2-for-10 from deep in the first half and struggled to connect from the field. The shooting performance was not one the stat line typically sees, compared to the almost 50 percent the team is shooting on the season.
“They were junking it up a little bit,” Sallee said. “It just took us a little bit of time to kind of get comfortable with what they were doing and how we got to attacking. So the kids did a good job of figuring it out on the fly.”
Ball State’s defense has been one of the top in the MAC this season. The Cardinals continued that, forcing 19 turnovers out of the Northern Illinois offense.
“I thought we just fed them up,” Sallee said. “In the first half, I thought they played in tempo a little bit too much. They were comfortable getting the ball up and down the floor. And, the fact that in the second half, we were able to flip that, was a big part of the win today.”
During the Cardinals’ ten-game win streak, the paint play has been an integral part of their success. That continued in today's game against the Huskies.
“I thought our ability to dominate on the boards was huge,” Sallee said. “Especially when we're not making outside shots, that becomes huge to go get second chance opportunities. So you got to make up for those points somehow, in between turning them over and going to get [offensive] boards, I thought that was huge.”
With the win, Ball State improves to 31-10 on the road since the 2021-22 season. Sallee credited the talent of his teams over the years and their ability to treat road trips like its business.
“Well, one, we got good players,” he said. “It's a little bit easier to win on the road when you got a good team. So that's certainly the number one part of it. But, I think these kids do a great job of preparing, and they understand the business trip side of what we're doing. They understand how tough it is to win on the road and the way we got to take care of business.”
Offensively, senior Ally Becki led the way with 20 points. Fellow senior Lachelle Austin had 17 and graduate student Maliyah Johnson had 13 points.
Coming off the bench, Johnson has played a major role in the Cardinals’ offense. A tall presence in the paint and her length defending shots have been a big piece off the bench for Sallee.
“She was a huge spark and force the way she went and got offensive boards,” Sallee said. “The way she finished around the rim, I thought was a huge spark and force that way. And we trust our bench, and they certainly played well today.”
Ball State used a 25-16 third quarter to pull away with its lead en route to a win. The Cardinals have not lost a game since their road trip to No. 11 Ohio State and are undefeated in MAC play.
In this run, they have won games by an average of 17.9 points per game. Ball State has dominated in every game and it seems like everything is rolling. Becki is averaging 16.8 points per game since the MAC slate began. Fellow senior Alex Richard is averaging 13.6 points and graduate student Elise Stuck is averaging 12.5.
Sallee thinks they have continued to improve, and every game they put more pieces together.
“I think they've been really good at continuing to find ways to get better,” he said. “They're letting me coach them and they're not getting bored with the repetitions that we take to get ready to play a particular game. They're letting us really game plan at a high level so we don't have to be as vanilla as maybe we thought early on we might have to be.”
Ball State remains on the road for its next game, traveling to Athens, Ohio to play Ohio University Jan. 29. Tip-off is scheduled for 7 p.m. from Ohio Convocation Center.
Contact Logan Connor via email at logan.connor@bsu.edu or via X @_loganconnor
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