After three consecutive road wins to start the season, the Fort Lewis College women’s basketball team came home Saturday to Whalen Gymnasium, and the result was no different.
Fort Lewis (4-0) jumped out to a 10-1 lead and never trailed against Northern New Mexico en route to a 69-46 win.
Alyssa Yocky led FLC with 17 points and Briana Clah added 13. Ande Lampert pulled down a game-high 11 rebounds for the Skyhawks.
“I’m happy that we won, but not with the way we won,” Fort Lewis head coach Jason Flores said. “The game was a hiccup. This wasn’t the same team that won three regional road games. It might have been a 20-point win, but it was a grind.”
There are a number of new faces on the Fort Lewis team this season, and it took no time for Flores to introduce most of them as 12 players saw playing time in the opening quarter. The Skyhawks shot 28-percent in opening frame, and the right mix on the floor was hard to find, but the opponents struggled even worse.
FLC opened up a quick lead and held a six-point advantage after forcing the Eagles into an 8-percent, 1-for-12 performance from the field in the first 10 minutes.
The Eagles (4-5) did a good job of keeping it close, though.
The visitors opened the second quarter with a run that cut the deficit to two.
However, each time the Eagles got within a basket, Fort Lewis redshirt freshman Kaitlyn Romero gave the home team some breathing room. Romero led the Skyhawks with seven first-half points that helped build a 25-19 halftime lead.
After the break, it was all Skyhawks.
“I kind of felt like they were getting tired as the game went on because of our rotation,” Yocky said. “We started pushing the ball more in transition, and they were pretty small so we wanted to take advantage of that.”
The Skyhawks bench was very effective and outscored the Eagles 26-8. On the boards, FLC controlled the action with a 56-36 advantage. The result was a dominant second half.
Fort Lewis outscored Northern New Mexico 24-11 in the third quarter and stretched a six-point lead to 19. The lead swelled to 25 in the fourth quarter and, when the final buzzer sounded, the FLC women had increased their winning streak to four games to start the new season.
“We beat them by 20 on the glass and really kept them at bay,” Flores said. “I love this team and I love these players. They’re fun to coach and fun to be around. We have a lot to improve on but we’re 4-0 and that’s a great start no matter how you look at it.”
Fort Lewis has plenty of time to regroup over the Thanksgiving break and will try to extend the winning streak to five against at 5:30 p.m. Dec. 2 against CSU-Pueblo in the Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference opener.
jfries@durangoherald.com
