The UW-Superior women's basketball team came into Wednesday evening's road game against the UW-LaCrosse Eagles riding high.
After all, the Yellowjackets brought a five-game winning streak along with them into Mitchell Hall after an impressive win over the UW-Platteville Pioneers on Saturday.
And while UW-Superior admittedly struggled through a 30-percent shooting, 12-turnover first half against the host Eagles, the Yellowjackets showed no signs of slowing down after halftime.
Spurred on by a big-game from Sally Linzmeier, the Yellowjackets took command in the second half, outscoring UW-LaCrosse 39-18 after the break to pull away for a 61-42 win.
With the victory, the Yellowjackets not only improved to 8-4 overall and 2-2 in WIAC play, they extended their winning streak to a school-record tying six games heading into Saturday's showdown with UW-Stevens Point at Mertz Mortorelli Gymnasium. UW-LaCrosse meanwhile dropped to 7-7 overall and 1-4 in league play with the loss.
The Yellowjackets took an early 11-8 lead behind six points from Vanessa Lebens (Roseville, Minn./Roseville Area), a three-pointer by Deandra Vavra (Cambridge, Minn./Cambridge-Isanti) and an inside score from Jayme Malnory (Eau Claire, Wis./Memorial) in the opening 6:59 of action.
UW-LaCrosse responded by scoring the next six points to take a 14-11 advantage on Mallory Cramer's layup with 9:16 remaining in the opening half.
The Eagles' lead would grow to 21-16 at the 3:24 mark on two more free throws from Cramer before a layup from Lebens, two free throws from Britnee Blake (Superior, Wis./Superior Senior) and a jumper from Linzmeier allowed the Yellowjackets to even matters 22-22 with 37 seconds left in the opening half.
UW-LaCrosse took a slight 24-22 lead into the intermission thanks to a layup by Cramer in the last 17 seconds of action.
The Yellowjackets started out aggressively in the second half behind Linzmeier, who scored six points in the opening 3:51 of the second half to give UW-Superior a 33-29 lead with 16:09 remaining in regulation.
A Vavra jumper and three-points from Hadley Skalmoski (Neenah, Wis./Neenah) upped the Yellowjackets' advantage to 38-29 at the 14:07 mark of the second half.
UW-Superior's lead eventually grew to 42-31 with 12:02 left on a steal and layup by Blake as well as two free throws by Linzmeier.
The Yellowjackets followed that up by taking a 46-31 advantage on a long jumper by Linzmeier with 8:54 remaining in regulation.
Linzmeier continued her strong play for UW-Superior over the next five minutes, knocking down a short jump shot to give the Yellowjackets a commanding 56-39 bulge at the 3:10 mark of the second half.
UW-LaCrosse would come no closer than 15 points the rest of the way as the Yellowjackets made 23-of-29 free throws for the game, including going 5-of-6 in the final 4:29 of the contest.
Offensively, Linzmeier paced UW-Superior with a game-high 22 points and 12 rebounds. Lebens added 12 points while Blake finished with 11 for the Yellowjackets.
The Eagles were led by Cramer with 14 points.
Milestone Update: With her 22 points Linzmeier jumped into 14th place on the all-time scoring list with 889 points. Next on the list is Maggie Dittburner (1976-80) with 933 points. She also moved from 16th to a tie for 13th on the all-time rebound list with 414. Next on the list at No. 12 is Sherri Odlevak (1977-81) who has 467. Her four steals give her 194 in her career, 24 away from setting a new school mark.
Opening tipoff against the Pointers is scheduled for 1 p.m. Saturday.