Greene County News
FAIRBORN — A 27-11 second quarter broke the game open and behind double-doubles from Chelsea Welch and Symone Simmons, and the Wright State women’s basketball team defeated Cincinnati Christian, 85-61, in the opening game of the Wright State Invitational, presented by Holiday Inn, Thursday at WSU’s Nutter Center.
Cincinnati Christian scored the opening basket of the game and the Eagles hung close throughout the first quarter, trailing by just one before a Myrthe den Heeten layup in the final minute put the Raiders up 15-12.
That score was the beginning of a 15-3 run by WSU to extend the lead to 28-15 and the margin grew to as much as 38-18 later in the period before Wright State went into the halftime break up 42-23.
The Raiders hit 10 of 14 shots in the second stanza to finish the half at 50 percent while Cincinnati Christian shot just 31 percent.
Carly Clodfelter gave the Raiders their biggest lead of the night at 60-33 with a putback jumper at the 3:22 mark of the third quarter and the Eagles would get no closer than 19 the rest of the way.
WSU shot 47 percent from the field for the contest and hit 18 of 26 free throws while Cincinnati Christian shot 35 percent and was eight of 15 at the stripe. Wright State held a 53-37 rebounding edge and led 52-28 in points in the paint, 25-9 in points off of turnovers and 21-13 in second-chance points.
Welch posted her first career double-double of 15 points and 10 rebounds to go along with five assists and three steals while Simmons recorded her third double-double of the season with 15 points and 11 boards. All 10 players that saw action for the Raiders scored at least five points, including senior forward Antania Hayes, who had eight points in her first game since a knee injury in last year’s Horizon League first round matchup against UIC.
Wright State (5-4) continues tournament play at 1:30 p.m. Monday, Dec. 19, as the Raiders host Eastern Kentucky, followed by Fort Wayne taking on Miami University at 4 p.m.
