LAWRENCEVILLE, NJ - The La Salle University Women's Basketball team is now at the halfway point to matching the best record to start a season at the school as the Explorers won their seventh straight to open the year with an 88-76 victory over the Rider Broncs, Saturday afternoon at Alumni Gymnasium.

 

Senior Crista Ricketts (Douglasville, PA/Daniel Boone) led all scorers with 19 points, playing just 19 minutes in the game, while the Explorers had three players come off the bench to hit for double figures. Freshman Jamie Walsh (Downingtown, PA/Downingtown East) scored 18 points, while freshman Morgan Robertson (Amarillo, TX/Amarillo) had 13 and sophomore Antonia Gale (Glenside, PA/Cheltenham) added 12, which are all career-highs for each.

 

With the victory, La Salle only trails the 1988-89 squad for the best start to open a season, a team that was 14-0 before its first loss. It also gives the Explorers six straight road wins, which has not happen since the 1991-92 season, while the six road wins this season is the most since the 1997-98 season, when La Salle won seven.

 

With the game tied early, the Explorers used a 7-0 run to open a 13-6 lead just four minutes into the contest. However, the Broncs (0-5) battled back to knot the game at 19-all with 11:31 left before half.

 

That is when the La Salle offense and defense started to roll. The Explorers outscored Rider 19-4 over the next nine minutes to race to a 15-point lead. Gale scored six points in the run, as did Ricketts, and when junior Carlene Hightower (Philadelphia, PA/Archbishop Prendergast) converted a pair of free throws, La Salle was up 38-23.

 

Walsh scored six of her nine first-half points after that, which included three made foul shots with just 1.8 seconds left before intermission to lift the Explorers to a 16-point lead as the teams headed into the locker rooms, 46-30.

 

The Explorers came out of the break playing the same way, holding Rider without a basket through the first five and a half minutes of the second half as they scored 11 straight to open a 27-point advantage at 57-30. They had it to as many as 28 points with less than five minutes to go, before Rider closed the game with a 21-5 run.

 

Gale and Robertson also added five rebounds to their totals, while both Hightower and junior Melanie Gibbons (Bridgewater, NJ/Bridgewater-Raritan) tied for game-high with seven each. Hightower added nine points, while sophomore Tara Lapetina (Philadelphia, PA/Archbishop Carroll) scored seven and had three assists.

 

The teams combined for 54 fouls and shot 75 foul shots, as La Salle was 30-for-45 from the foul line and Rider was 24-for-30, nine of which were hit in the last four minutes.

 

La Salle (7-0) returns home to face Delaware, Tuesday night starting at 7 PM.