Special to The T&D
The Lady Panthers of Claflin University brought in the New Year with a bang, defeating the Lady Golden Bulls of Johnson C. Smith University 64-52 Wednesday at the Jonas T. Kennedy Physical Education Center.
The win avenged an earlier loss one month ago to the Lady Golden Bulls in Charlotte, N.C., by a 58-40 score.
The Lady Golden Bulls started the game on fire as it would appear that they would again have an easy way with the Lady Panthers. The visitors scored easy and often in the first 7 minutes of play. But the Lady Bulls could only build a 6-point lead through their dominant play. With 11:26 left in the opening half things changed quickly. With the visitors leading 17-11, the Lady Panthers went on an 18-6 run to lead by 6 points (27-21) with 1:56 in the half. JCSU outscored CU in the last minute 4-2 to see the home team leading by four points 29-25, at the break Jayshaun Bailey and Britani Martin lead the CU charges with 8 first half points. Amber Stoney led JCSU with 8 first-half points.
CU dominated the beginning of the second half as JCSU did the first. But the Lady Panthers would not give ground as their opponents did in the first half. And by the 16:05 mark the Lady Panthers found themselves up by 10 points, 41-31. CU's lead would balloon to 15 points 57-42 with 8:18 remaining, with Ashley Sorrell-Gibson and Britani Martin continuing to find the mark from behind the arc, with (2) 3-point shots each, during the span. With JCSU seemingly puzzled as how to stop CU, the Lady Panthers would build their largest lead of the evening, 16 points at 60-46, as 5:12 remained in the contest. CU coasted the rest of the way to win 64-52.
The Lady Panthers and Panthers will be in action Saturday, Jan. 5, at home to take on Lemoyne-Owen College at 2 p.m. and 4 p.m.
Claflin Men win
The Claflin Men defeated Shaw Univeristy 81-58 Wednesday.
Phillip Brown led the Panthers (11-1) with 27 points while Karly Ray had 16 points and 15 rebounds. Jerome Starr added 10 points.