Nashville, Tenn. - Host Lipscomb (3-10, 1-2 Atlantic Sun) used crisp passing and accurate shooting to take down the Stetson women's basketball team (1-11, 1-2 A-Sun) 79-60 Saturday afternoon at Allen Arena. Lipscomb finished the game with 22 assists on 27 field goals and shot 42.2 percent from the floor. Sophomore guard Kerri Simpson (Charleston, Tenn.) led three Hatters in double figures with 15 points and six rebounds. Junior forward Jessica Conner (Cocoa, Fla.) added 12 points and seven rebounds.
Lipscomb made eight of its first 14 field goal attempts off the opening tip and got out to an 18-10 lead with 12:38 left in the first half. Stetson made a nice charge following the next media timeout to cut the gap to one point, but could not even it up before intermission; the Hatters were held without a field goal for the final 2:46. Lady Bisons forward Brittany Duerk banked home a jumper with three seconds left that gave her team a 32-26 lead at halftime. Stetson quickly fell further behind in the second half and never caught up.
Senior forward Ashli Jackson (Opelika, Ala.) scored 11 points and in the process tied former teammate Sharnesha Smith '09 for 10th place on the Stetson all-time three-point field goals list. Jackson has 65 career made three-pointers. Junior centers Natasha Graboski (Upper Sandusky, Ohio) and Daphnee Frieson (Mobile, Ala.) grabbed eight and seven rebounds, respectively.
Chelsea McMeans led Lipscomb with 17 points and seven rebounds; Jenna Bartsokas (12 points, six assists) and Chelsea Burroughs (10 points, five assists) had excellent games quarterbacking the Lady Bison offense.
The Hatters complete the Nashville swing Monday at Belmont. Tip-off is set for 5 p.m. Central (6 p.m. Eastern) and can be seen on A-Sun.TV.
