DeKALB — NIU women’s basketball (2-4) earned its second straight win with a come-from-behind 67-57 victory over the Chicago State University Cougars (1-5) on Monday.
“I’m just really proud of the girls for staying resilient and kept fighting when we dug ourselves a little bit of a hole in the first quarter,” said NIU head women’s basketball coach Jacey Brooks. “We could have easily just packed out stuff and not fought back. So I’m really proud we were able to do that.”
After starting the season 0-4, NIU has now won back-to-back games against CSU and Southern Illinois University Edwardsville.
The Huskies came from behind after facing a 14-point deficit at the conclusion of the first quarter, going on to outscore the Cougars 58-34 in the final three quarters.
NIU had 12 turnovers for the game, the team’s lowest total this season. Entering Monday’s contest, NIU was averaging just under 18 turnovers a game this year.
The Huskies shot 44 free throws on Monday, the most for NIU this season, shooting 75% for the game.
NIU drew 28 fouls in the game, including 13 in the fourth quarter which resulted in the Huskies shooting 20 fourth quarter free throws, compared to CSU drawing 19 fouls.
Outside of the big game at the free throw line, NIU shot just 32.7% percent from the field and 12.5% from the three, with freshman guard Emilie Sorenson being the only Huskie to make a three in the game.
“Conintuing to get high percentage opportunities for our team,” Brooks said. “As a unit we don’t shoot a ton of threes. Obviously, you want to shoot it better than 12% so we’ll continue to work on that, get rhythm shots, if the shots are on rhythm I’m okay with them, but we’ll continue to evaluate.”
The Huskies finished the game with three players double figure scorers, with senior forward Teresa Mbemba leading the way with 19 points.
“I’m just really happy and proud of my team for staying together when things were going down,” Mbemba said. “We never gave up, we never gave up on each other, we just stayed together. And that just was a motivation for me, just to be there for my team.”
Mbemba’s 19 points in Monday’s contest was her season high, well above her previous season high of six. Mbemba scored 15 points in the second half to fuel the Huskies’ comeback.
Graduate student guard Nadechka Laccen was the second leading scorer for NIU with 14 points, shooting 2/9 from the field and 0/3 from three but had a team high 12 free throw attempts, going 10/12.
Sorenson also scored in double figures, with 10 in the first and 12 for the game, shooting 2/5 from three and 6/8 from the charity stripe.
NIU’s next game will be against the University of Evansville at 3 p.m. Sunday in Evansville, Indiana. Live stats will be available via Stat Broadcast.
