CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas – Despite three players in double-figure scoring, led by
Emma Young's career-high 16 points, the Texas A&M-Corpus Christi women's basketball team could pull off a victory in the inaugural women's basketball game in the South Texas Showdown, presented by NavyArmy Community Credit Union, falling 68-65 to UT-Rio Grande Valley.
The Islanders (3-3) and Vaqueros (5-3) battled back and forth the entire game in an instant classic, featuring 12 ties, four lead changes and no lead larger than seven points.
"I did not think we had a very good shooting night from the perimeter," head coach
Royce Chadwick said. "I thought we got some layups early that we didn't finish, as well as some opportunities for and-ones that we couldn't complete. They made some big plays down the stretch attacking us, and we didn't step up to take charges."
A&M-Corpus Christi finished the game shooting 37.1-percent, but it only managed to drain a pair of 3-pointers. The Blue and Green left 11 points at the charity stripe, going 17-for-28, compared to the 20-for-24 for UTRGV.
"We left a lot of plays out there that we should have finished," Chadwick continued. "Obviously, when you do those things and miss that many free throws, it's more than likely that you won't be successful. That's what happened to us tonight."
Kassie Jones tied the contest, with two of her seven points, at the 2:41 mark of the fourth quarter, but three free throws by the Vaqueros set up a game-tying opportunity for the Islanders with three seconds remaining. However,
Brittany Mbamalu fired a corner 3-pointer that grazed the wrong side of the rim to end the game.
DAVIS DOUBLES AGAIN
Senior
Camesha Davis continued her double-double output this year, scoring 10 points and hauled down 11 rebounds for the fourth consecutive game. She also finished with two assists, one block and two steals.
"I think Camesha is playing the best basketball of her career," Chadwick said. "She's doing more things for us than just rebounding and scoring to help our team be in positions to win. She's playing defense, diving on the floor, making hustle plays. We need to her to be as selfish as possible sometimes to go out and make more plays for us."
The DeSoto native is now tied for 5th in the record book with Jackie Ododa (2003-05) and Jean Clark (1999-02) at 11 career-double doubles. This season, Davis is averaging 9.3 points, 9.2 rebounds and 1.6 blocks per game.
Davis is the first Islander to have four straight double-doubles since school-record holder Elisa Beagle (2005-10) recorded four in the 2009-10 season.
SCORING STREAKS
For the third consecutive game, A&M-Corpus Christi saw three players cross the 10-point threshold, as
Ashanti Plummer joined Davis and Young with her 10. It marked Davis' 27th time scoring at least 10 points, while Plummer topped the number of 10-point games in her career coming into the season with her third of the year.
The Islanders have not had three straight games of at least three players in double-figures since January 2014.
TURNING TO TUESDAY
The Islanders wrap up their non-conference home schedule against Schreiner on Tuesday in the Dugan Wellness Center at 7 p.m. The two teams have not met since 2001, when the Islanders set the program record for points, field goals made and field goals attempted in a 124-58 drubbing.
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- Go Islanders -
