By DON O'BRIEN
Herald-Whig Sports Editor
Any hope the Southern Indiana women's basketball team had of playing spoiler lasted all of eight minutes on Saturday afternoon.
Quincy University wasn't about to be denied at Pepsi Arena. The Lady Hawks rattled off 20 straight points during one first-half stretch and coasted to an 89-59 Great Lakes Valley Conference win.
"Offensively, we ran the ball up the floor every single time, which was important," Lady Hawks coach JD Gravina said. "We had one of our best defensive efforts all year. We've kind of tweaked our man-to-man defense, and I think that's really helped."
USI (9-16, 4-13 GLVC) went scoreless for nearly six minutes after holding a 10-7 lead with 12 minutes, 55 seconds left in the first half.
In the meantime, the Lady Hawks bombed away from the outside, hitting four 3-pointers during their 20-0 run.
Janette Burgin, who had six 3-pointers on Tuesday night, had four 3-pointers and scored 15 points during the run.
"We love putting up points, but a lot of it this game was because of our defense," said Burgin, who finished with a career-high 23 points four days after scoring 22 in a 98-82 victory over SIU-Edwardsville. "The defense basically drove our offense."
QU forced USI into 17 first-half turnovers en route to a 40-15 halftime lead. The Lady Hawks ended the half on a 33-5 run as the Screaming Eagles shot just 30 percent from the floor.
"We knew they were athletic and could score inside and outside," junior Jessica Keller said of USI. "We had some challenges, but we set our minds to it and played some defense."
USI made one short push in the second half and cut the Lady Hawks' lead to 20 once, but never got any closer.
Fresh off the first triple-double in program history, Keller nearly did it again. She finished with 14 points, 11 rebounds and eight steals.
Lindsey Stellflue added 14 points, while freshman Courtney Shuman was strong off the bench with 10 points and six rebounds.
Brittany Darden and Jasmine Baines scored 11 points each to lead USI.
QU (17-8, 12-5) wrapped up a spot in the GLVC Tournament as a result of the win. The Lady Hawks likely will be the three seed and have to hit the road for an opening-round game on March 4.
They'll close out the regular season with home games next week against Rockhurst and Drury.
-- dobrien@whig.com/221-3365
