The No. 20 Texas A&M began its season in Reed Arena against Rice, Wednesday night, defeating the Owls 65-54. The Aggies have a new look after losing four of their starters, but leaned on last year’s freshman of the year, Chennedy Carter to start the season on a high note.
The Aggies played a different style of basketball, with this offense moving much more quickly and fluidly with less dependence on plays to score. For the first time in head coach Gary Blair’s career he started a line-up consisting of five sophomores.
A&M went up early and never looked back as they went on a 13-1 run and held a 10-point lead at halftime.
The Aggies backcourt was dominating as Aaliyah Wilson scored 11 points and Carter had 14 points at halftime.Wilson and Carter outscored the entire Rice team by seven points at the half. Kayla Wells was the only other Aggie with points as she scored three out of her four free throw attempts in the first half.
A&M’s defense also stepped up as they held Rice to shooting 28.6 percent in the first half and incredibly kept them to only six points in the second quarter.
The second half was more of the same dominance from the Aggies but this time it wouldn’t be a two person show as Wells got off to a hot start scoring five points on back-to-back shots to start the third quarter. The back court continued its dominance as Rice could not contain Carter’s scoring or passing ability as she filled in the stat sheet.
Carter finished the night leading all scorers with 22 points, five rebounds, four assists and two steals. Shambria Washington came off the bench to provide four assists. Wilson finished her big night with 18 points and three assists.
With the win, A&M continues an eight home game winning streak going back to last season.
Blair said he was proud of his team’s defense in the postgame press conference.
“I would like to commend our Jada Walton in the first half with her defense and Aaliyah Jackson came in the second half, and they played exceptional,” Blair said. “Chea Rael-Whitsitt came in and gave some big minutes, because she did the majority of the guarding of their big players. Our big focus is that we wanted to get other people involved and we did that.”
The Aggies will see the court again on Sunday when they face the Jacksonville Dolphins at Reed Arena. Tipoff is set to begin at 6 p.m.