Mathis’ career high gives Lamar women 39-point win over Corpus Christi

Published 12:57 am Sunday, December 31, 2017

Lamar sports information

CORPUS CHRISTI – DeA’ngela Mathis scored a career-high 20 points to lead the Lamar Cardinals to a convincing 70-31 win over the host Texas A&M-Corpus Christi Islanders in a Southland Conference women’s basketball game Saturday.

Mathis, who made her first start of the season, scored 18 points after intermission as the Cardinals (7-5 overall, 2-0 Southland) improved to 14-9 all-time against the Islanders. Mathis’ previous career high was a 15-point effort against Howard Payne earlier this season.

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“DeA’ngela was a junior college All-American, and we were waiting for her to have a breakout game,” LU coach Robin Harmony said. “She had that tonight. We think that will help her confidence. With her in the starting lineup, we have another offensive weapon. It really makes a big difference. It gives us another option.”

Moe Kinard added 17 points and a game-high nine rebounds for LU as the Cardinals own the two largest margins of victory thus far in conference play this year.

LU committed a season-low seven turnovers, while the Islanders (7-6, 0-2) committed 26 turnovers. As a result, LU had a 26-2 advantage in points off turnovers.

“We did a great job protecting the ball while creating a lot of turnovers,” Harmony said. “Those turnovers are our offense. That’s 66 turnovers by our opponents in our first two conference games. That really helps our offense.”

Chastadie Barrs and Jadyn Pimentel each had three steals for LU. Barrs now has at least one steal in all 73 games in her career. The junior boosted her career total to 342 steals, 17 shy of the Southland Conference record of 359 held by Nina Randle of Louisiana-Monroe. Barrs added a game-high six assists in the win.

Kiandra Bowers and Baileigh O’Dell had nine points apiece for LU. Bowers added six rebounds, giving her 731 for her career, pushing her past Dominique Edwards for sixth place on LU’s all-time list.