Senior Susan Kies turned in a game-high 35 points, including five three-pointers, while freshman Sidney Beckman also buried a career-best five long range buckets, to help send the Buena Vista women's basketball team past Bethany Lutheran on Tuesday night, 99-72.
Kies made 13-of-19 shots from the field, including 5-of-7 from three-point range, while making all four free-throw attempts. She also added four rebounds and three steals, defensively. It was the first 30-point game for BVU since Margo Muhlbauer totaled 31 back on December 20, 2009 against Caltech. It's the highest single-game total for the Beavers since Muhlauer reached 39 later that same season against Central College.
Beckman drained 5-of-8 attempts and 5-of-10 overall from the field in just 13 minutes. It was just her third career game, and she came in having totaled just five points in the first two.
Shelby Wiederhoeft chalked up her third double-double of the year, scoring 14 points and grabbing 13 rebounds. She's now hauled in 10+ rebounds in all four games this season. Senior Malarie Gilley, who was named the Iowa Conference Female Athlete of the Week on Monday, just missed another double-double of her own, as she added 12 points and eight rebounds.
Sophomore Lexi Fisher also hit double figures, chiming in with 12 points and two steals, while Lacey Vokt made her first career start and matched her career-high with five assists.
Ten players scored for BVU, which just missed out on reaching the century mark in back-to-back games. That feat has happened just once in school history (1996-97).
The Knights held a slim 11-8 lead in the early going before a three-pointer by Fisher sparked a 9-0 Beaver run to give them a 17-11 lead. Bethany Lutheran got back within 26-24 8:03 left in the first half. JadeLynn Vlotho's bucket with 4:03 remaining pushed the margin into double figures for the first time at 38-28 before Beckman hit two three-pointers and Kies added another to extend the margin to 47-30 and give BVU a comfortable 50-33 lead at the break. Kies fnished the first half with 24 of her 35 points.
Bethany Lutheran was never able to get enough of a run together, as BVU maintained the lead which grew to as many as 34 with 5:19 left in the second half.
The Beavers got 34 bench points in the contest and out-rebounded the Knights, 45-29. They also scored 16 second chance points, compared to just two for Bethany Lutheran.
BVU has now won three straight games overall and improves to 3-2 on the year. The team will take the court next when it takes part in the Simpson College Classic this upcoming Friday and Saturday, November 29-30 in Indianola. The Beavers will take on Grand View University at 5:00pm on Friday before playing Illinois Tech at 1:00pm on Saturday.