Amari Carter Propels Lady Lions to Win Over Purdue

Story posted February 22, 2019 in CommRadio, Sports by Carolyn Sistrand

UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. - Penn State came back home and took down the Purdue Boilermakers in convincing fashion, 72-61, on Thursday night at the Bryce Jordan Center.

The Lady Lions were coming off a road loss to Minnesota and in need of a morale-boosting win. The Boilermakers were riding a high after beating Northwestern Sunday and fell short of making it out of the middle pack of the Big Ten standings.

“It felt really good to come home and play in front of fans after being on the road all last week,” Penn State head coach Coquese Washington said.

Purdue’s only lead of the game came early, as they scored their first two points from the free throw line. After Penn State got on the board, there was not turning back as they maintained the lead throughout the rest of the contest.

Senior guard Amari Carter put up an impressive 18 points on the night, inching her way closer to the 1000-point career mark. Carter entered today’s game in need of 81 points in the next five games, an average of 14.2 points per game to reach the milestone.

Junior guard Siyeh Frazier also impressed with 18 points on the night, always finding a lane open and often drawing the foul.

“My teammates opened a lot of that up with knocking down open threes,” Frazier said. “They gave me opportunities to drive to the basket and get looks one-on-one.”

Junior guard Jaida Travascio-Green hit 3-point shot after shot, finishing that night with three 3-pointers and 14 total points.

Strength on the offensive front transferred on defense as well, as the Lady Lions were able to force 10 Boilermaker turnovers in the first half alone. By the end of the second half, they were able to tack on five more.

“I did feel like we were in control,” Carter said. “They were trying to adjust to the things we were doing and they didn’t get into a good rhythm. When they went on a run, we stopped their run. I think we did a really good job on the defensive end.”

Freshman forward Lauren Ebo was a strong man in the key on both ends, putting up 8 points for the Lady Lions and turning around to be a game-changer on defense. The Boilermakers were able to get the best of Ebo, however, causing her to draw four fouls.

Known for their strong rebounding and having an offensive leader in Karissa McLaughlin, who had 13 points on the night, Washington knew the second half would bring a refocused and re-energized Boilermaker’s team. 

“One of the adjustments we felt like they would make would be to try and go inside a little bit more, take advantage of our lack of size and their height advantage and try to attack us from the high-low position,” Washington said. “We also thought they would be more aggressive off the ball screens.”

Coming out of halftime, Penn State continued to carry the momentum of the game, never giving up their lead.

Penn State walked away with the 72-61 home victory, with only one more game left to be played at the Bryce Jordan Center this season.

For a team that has faced some challenges being on the road, coming back to the BJC and snatching the win seemed to be the remedy to their homesickness.

“We really just played together as a team,” Washington said. “I’m proud of how we played from beginning to end.”

The Lady Lions head to Illinois on Sunday to take on the Illini in Champaign at 4 p.m.

 

 

Carolyn Sistrand is a senior majoring in broadcast journalism and history. To contact her, please email carolynsistrand@gmail.com.

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Carolyn Sistrand

Senior / Broadcast Journalism, History

Carolyn Sistrand is a senior from Framingham, Massachusetts double majoring in Broadcast Journalism and History and is a certificate candidate in the John Curley Center for Sports Journalism. For CommRadio, Carolyn works as a co-editor on the management team as well as contributing content for the sports department. Her roles include: being a writer, an analyst, an on-air personality on talk shows and podcasts, live play-by-play, as well as production. She is a co-founder for CommRadio’s first all-girl’s NFL podcast, Gridiron Girls, which is now a live all-sports talk show airing Friday’s from 5 p.m. to 5:30 p.m. Outside of CommRadio, Carolyn has had professional experience as a multimedia journalism intern for The Metrowest Daily News (Framingham, MA) and AccuWeather Headquarters (State College, PA). She is currently covering Penn State softball as an intern for GoPSUSports.com (University Park, PA). To contact Carolyn, please email .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).