Bloomington, Ill. - A dominant performance by Hannah Considine and a strong defensive effort led the Wheaton Thunder women's basketball team to a 69-53 victory at Illinois Wesleyan on Wednesday night. With the victory, Wheaton moves back into first place in the CCIW standings. Wheaton improves to 14-4 overall with the victory and 6-2 in the CCIW. Illinois Wesleyan had its six-game win streak snapped with the loss, falling to 11-8 overall and 6-2 in conference play.

Wheaton enjoyed a wire-to-wire victory while shooting 42% (27-64) from the field despite only shooting 27.8% (5-18) from beyond the arc. Wheaton was a solid 76.9% (10-13) from the free throw line. Illinois Wesleyan was held to just 29% (18-62) from the field and shot 26.3% (5-19) from the three-point line. The Titans were an even 75% (12-16) at the charity stripe. Wheaton owned a commanding 49-35 advantage on the glass despite allowing 15 offensive rebounds.

Hannah Considine opened the scoring after a two-minute scoring drought to open the game and jump-started an 8-0 start for the Thunder that was capped by a Chantal Meacham three-pointer. Illinois Wesleyan recovered to score the next eight points to tie the game at 8-8 with 3:26 remaining in the quarter. A three-point play by Jennifer Berg with just over a minute left broke a 10-all tie and gave Wheaton a 13-10 advantage at the end of the first quarter. Wheaton outscored the Titans 10-2 in points off turnovers in the first ten minutes.

The second quarter was a dominant effort on the defensive end of the floor as the Thunder held the Titans without a field goal until a three-pointer with 1:27 to play in the half. Consecutive lay-ups by Kelly Lawson started a 12-0 Thunder run that expanded the lead to 26-11. The Titans were held scoreless for a stretch of six minutes and 15 seconds during the run as Wheaton pulled away for a 29-16 halftime lead.

Illinois Wesleyan cut the lead down to nine points on a pair of occasions early in the third quarter but an 8-0 Wheaton run finally put things out of reach as the lead grew to 43-26 at the midway point of the third quarter. Considine scored eight of her game-high 26 points in the third quarter with Katie McDaniels adding five in the frame.

Wheaton opened the fourth quarter on an 11-2 run to push the lead to a game-high 24 points with 7:39 to play on another Considine lay-in. The Titans would widdle the lead down to as few as 14 late in the quarter but would not get within striking range as the Thunder closed out the 69-53 victory.

Considine led all scorers with 26 points and also grabbed eight rebounds. Katie McDaniels scored 14 points to go with six assists. Chantal Meacham was Wheaton's leading distributor with nine assists to go along with nine points. Kelly Lawson added eight points and five rebounds. Devin Kyler led all players with a game and career-high 14 rebounds. Gabrielle Holness led the Titans with 12 points.

Wheaton will be back in action on Saturday night when the Thunder travel to Naperville to face the North Central Cardinals at 5 PM at Gregory Arena. Wheaton has won 14 straight against the Cardinals including 12 in a row under Kent Madsen.