With Sarah Lamp scoring 26 points and grabbing 11 rebounds, the North Central Missouri College Lady Pirates were able to find the win column on Wednesday night, opening February with a 68-56 victory at Southeast Community College in Beatrice, Nebraska.
The ‘double-double’ for Lamp, a freshman forward from Kirksville, is her 16th such performance of the season. The Storm, playing the Lady Pirates for the second time in 11 nights, put defensive emphasis on slowing down freshman point guard Kendey Eaton, and was generally effective in holding the Mound City native to 11 points. Sophomore forward Jami Nickerson scored 12 in moving NCMC to 16-5 on the season.
Coach Jenni Croy, in comments to NCMCPirates.com, credited the Southeast coaching staff for their defensive strategy against Eaton, saying “They tried to take Kendey away by running a box and one on her. The trouble with that is we have multiple scorers on the floor”.
Southeast was led by Jay’la Brown with 15 points, with DeAsia Walker and Kaatia Watene both scoring 10.
While things look very rosy for the Lady Pirates coming off an unbeaten month of January, the second game of February looms as the biggest of the season for North Central. On Saturday afternoon, NCMC will play at St. Louis Community College. The 1 o’clock contest will be broadcast on Hot Country Z 101.7, with pregame at 12:45. Both the Lady Pirates and the Lady Archers are 3-0, tied for first place in Region XVI play. St. Louis is 7-2 inside the Forest Park Fieldhouse this season.
