Texas Tech Athletics
3-0,0-0Big 12
New Mexico
1-2,0-0Mountain West
Merritt dishes out seven assists in 75-68 win
November 12, 2024 | Women's Basketball
LUBBOCK, Texas – Graduate Jordyn Merritt dished out a career-high seven assists and four Lady Raiders posted double-digit performances as Texas Tech defeated the New Mexico Lobos by a 75-68 score on Tuesday evening at the United Supermarkets Arena.
Merritt played 19 minutes but made the most of it as she totaled seven assists, five rebounds and a block. Leading the team in points for the second-consecutive game was junior Jasmine Shavers with 18 points, while adding three rebounds, two assists, two steals and a block. All 18 of Shavers' points came in the second half and 13 of those came in the fourth quarter alone as she shot 50 percent from the field (5-for-10) in that period. Â
Three players also totaled 10 points apiece on the night. Junior Sarengbe Sanogo had her second double-figure game with the Lady Raiders with 10 points on 4-for-9 shooting as well as a team-high of seven rebounds and a career-high four blocks. Sophomore Loghan Johnson had her best performance in this early season after coming off the bench and providing a big-time spark for Tech. In just 14 minutes of play, she recorded 10 points two rebounds, an assist and a steal. In addition, junior Bailey Maupin had 10 points after going a perfect 5-for-5 at the free throw line.
Junior Jada Wynn had herself a night after putting up eight points with back-to-back 3-pointers to start the second half leading to a Lady Raider run. Wynn also added a team-best seven rebounds with two assists and steals. The Lady Raiders forced 17 New Mexico turnovers while outrebounding the Lobos 41 to 32, with 16 offensive boards in the process.
In the first quarter, New Mexico scored first, but Tech followed with a couple of free throws from Denae Fritz. Shavers would grab a steal which turned into two free throws from Maupin as she got fouled on the layup attempt. Sanogo added another layup to make it 6-4, then got a block on the other end of the court. However, the Lobos went on an 8-0 run to take a 12-8 lead. Both teams went back and forth, but New Mexico held on to the lead heading into the next quarter, 23-18.
The Lady Raiders outscored the Lobos 19-11 in the second quarter to retake the lead at half. The scoring started when Jalynn Bristow stole the ball from New Mexico and made a fast break layup. Then, Sanogo scored another layup before the Lobos answered with one of their own. Halfway through the quarter, Bristow made a layup, Adlee Blacklock knocked down a three and Johnson converted the and-one play to cap off an 8-0 run over just 46 seconds. The Lobos outscored the Lady Raiders in the final three and a half minutes, but Tech held on to lead 37-34 at the half.
Wynn came out of the half on fire as she made two 3-pointers to give Tech a 43-36 advantage. The Lobos responded with a layup right after before Johnson scored again to reach double-digits on the night. New Mexico went on a 4-0 run heading into the media timeout to close the gap, 45-44. New Mexico took a slim, 48-47 lead but Shavers nailed down a 3-pointer, then a mid-range jumper right after for the 52-48 advantage. The Lobos made three free throws, then Maupin hit a jumper with a few seconds left for a 54-51 lead.
New Mexico made a layup to cut the Tech lead to one, but the Lady Raiders answered with a 6-0 run, highlighted by a block from Sanogo, and layups from Wynn, Shavers and Sanogo to force a Lobos timeout. The scoring continued, but this time it was Shavers who scored the next 10 points for the Lady Raiders, highlighted by back-to-back threes for the 68-56 lead. The Lobos kept chipping away, but Texas Tech held their lead to win it by a 75-68 score.
Up next, Texas Tech will host Washington State on Saturday, Nov. 16 at 6 p.m. at the United Supermarkets Arena.
Quoteables
Head Coach Krista Gerlich
Opening statement…
"That was a really good win for us. I think that obviously New Mexico played really hard, and they came at us and did a lot of good things, and we had to make some adjustments throughout the game. We had to have different people step up to give us some momentum, and when we weren't shooting the ball very well, but I thought that we hung in there and really adjusted well. I thought that we got on the glass like we talked about, and for the most part, took care of the basketball. There were a couple of turnovers that we would like to have back, and then we didn't do a great job on [Joaquim] Hooks, but I thought that the longer the game went on, we had different people stepping up, including Jada [Wynn], to try to get her to slow down a little bit, and late in the game, those stops were really, really big for us. So it's not pretty. We're not playing our best basketball at all, not even close, but we are getting better every game. That's all we can do right now, is continue to get better and keep getting in the gym and shooting the basketball, because we are much better shooters than what we're showing right now."
On preparing for the next game…
"Like I said, we're not playing our best basketball by any means, and we are having to fight through some things. And you want to be able to fight through some adversity and learn some things about yourself while still getting wins. So, we want to protect our home court. We know that our competition is going to continue to get better and better, and Saturday is going to be a big game for us. We need a lot of people to come fill the stands for us and help us with that home court advantage. Our kids have to learn how to continue to grind it out. You know, I think that they showed up some unity and some toughness tonight that that we haven't had to use in the first two games, and that's going to be really important for us down the road."
#23 Sophomore Loghan Johnson
On her mindset coming off the bench…
"For me, it's definitely just staying aggressive, playing within myself, playing confident and being the best player I can be on both sides of the ball."
#24 Junior Jada Wynn
On how much the defense helped when struggling on offense…
"I mean, defense is huge. On offense, your shots aren't always going to fall. But you know, Coach Gerlach is big on defense… That's her priority. And, I think we've all tried to buy into that. Me, especially like last year, I wasn't the fastest on ball guarding, but I feel like that's an aspect of my game that I've really tried to focus on improving. But yeah, Defense wins championships, and we need to continue defending and keeping people out of the paint going forward."
