KENOSHA, Wis. – The Carthage College Lady Reds used season highs in points, rebounds and assists to squeak past a stingy North Central College team, who overcame a 16-point second half deficit, to defeat the Cardinals, 101-95, Wednesday, January 20th at Tarble Arena.
 
As a team, the Lady Reds (7-10, 3-3 CCIW) shot 55.9-percent from the field on 38-of-68 shooting and 10-19 from beyond the arc, while dishing out 33 assists and collecting 50 rebounds over the Cardinals (8-9, 2-4 CCIW).
 
"It's one of those things like Bobby Knight said, 'You prepare your team in practice, then in the game, you hope they do the right things,'" said head coach Tim Bernerofollowing the exciting win.  "This is to a different degree of that, because I feel as though I have as much control as you guys [media members] do, just sitting and watching.  We were either going to get turn it over or we were not.  We were going to make layups or we were not.  We were going to get rebounds or we were not.  You try to recreate it as much as you can in practice and today it showed we did just enough."
 
 Morgan Harris led all scorers in the game with 24 points, which included shooting 10-of-11 from the free throw line.  A season high six Lady Reds scored in double-figures Wednesday, led by Morgan Harris with 24 points and going 10-of-11 from the free throw line.  Behind Harris was Bailey Gilbert with 17, Morgan Vukovich with 16,Mandy Hozzian with 14, Erin Thomas with 12, and Monica Masini with 10.
 
Although only having eight points on the night, Rachel Szydlowski had a game-high and a Carthage season-high with 17 rebounds for the Lady Reds and four blocks.   Gilbert dished-out seven assists to lead Carthage.
 
North Central jumped out to a quick six-point lead on the Lady Reds, which the Cardinals maintained throughout half of the first quarter.  Carthage, however, found away to break the pesky Cardinals press and slow their offense down, while the Lady Reds turned it on, dishing off 10 assists on 11 made baskets in the quarter to even it up at 28-28 after the first ten minutes.
 
The second quarter saw the Lady Reds go from hot to on fire shooting the ball, as the Lady Reds shot 10-16 in the quarter and built an 11-point lead which Carthage would take into the break at 52-41.
 
The third quarter saw the tables turn in favor of the Cardinals, outscoring the Lady Reds 29-18 in the third.  North Central took advantage of 11 third quarter turnovers to pull back to even in game, 70-70, with the fourth quarter remaining.
 
After being held without a field goal for the first two-plus minutes of the fourth, and relinquishing the lead for the first time since the first quarter, Carthage regained a one-point lead at 72-71 on a running layup by Thomas. Morgan Vukovich, who was battling foul trouble all night, hit a jumper to push the lead to three, and following a pair of free throws by the Cardinals, Thomas hit her next two jumpers to put the Lady Reds up five.  The Cardinals would make one more push down the stretch to try and comeback, but the Lady Reds closed the game shooting 9-of-11 from the free throw line late in the game to outlast the Cardinals.
 
Looking at the fourth quarter Bernero noted, "For all of the stuff which we have done this year that hasn't been up to our standard, this is the best team I have had shooting free throws in 13 years.  Gilbert is really good.  Thomas is really good.  And Harris, obviously, is one of the better free throw shooters in the conference.  So having that going for you at the end is key.  The other thing was we got in some foul trouble.  We lost Vukovich early and Harris had four; we played that stretch where we kind of grabbed control of the game with Micala Giammarinoand Erin Thomas handling the ball."
 
For North Central, the Cardinals had five in double-figures, led by Mayson Whipple with 22 points.
 
The Lady Reds return to action on the road Saturday, January 23rd as Carthage heads to Wheaton College for a 5:00 p.m. game against the Thunder.  The Lady Reds will be followed by the Red Men at Wheaton in the second part of the doubleheader, slated for a 7:00 p.m. tip.