In front of a screaming crowd of school children during its annual Elementary School Day game, Texas A&M women’s basketball survived an early scare to handily beat Tarleton State 79-64 on Thursday, Nov. 13, at Reed Arena.
“Before I came down to media, there was a section of kids I walked by,” junior guard Salese Blow said. “ … They were just like, swarming me. They wanted autographs and wanted hugs. It just really warms my heart just to see, because I already love kids, but just to see them have fun in this type of atmosphere, it makes me happy.”
The rowdy crowd wasn’t enough to give A&M the boost it needed early after the morning tip-off, as it entered the first media timeout of the game down 14-4, Tarleton State. Things didn’t get much better through the rest of the first period thanks to the Texans’ 3-point shooting, as the visitors went 5-for-9 from beyond the arc in the first quarter to go up 20-13.
“Last game, I feel like we started off super aggressive,” graduate student forward Lauren Ware said. “In this game we didn’t, which I think was why we had the slow start.”
As Tarleton State’s red-hot shooting cooled down, A&M battled back in the paint to take a 34-33 lead at halftime. Ware led the Aggies with 11 points at the break, while the team combined to go 10-for-18 from the charity stripe and had 14 points in the paint.
Blow — a Wichita State transfer playing just her second game in maroon — gave the Aggies their final 10 points of the first half, sparking an offensive run that gave A&M its first lead of the game. She finished the game with 18 points, the most for the A&M roster.
“Salese plays to be perfect,” coach Joni Taylor said. “And so our challenge to her is like, ‘It’s not perfection that you’re chasing, right? It’s your best every single day.’ And so even when she messed up today, she was able to [take her] next best action — what we said to her, ‘NBA’ — and she did that today.”
In the third quarter, the Aggies pulled away, as they shot 60% from the field in the period while outscoring the visitors 24-15.
A&M needed that improved shooting to stop Tarleton State senior G Gia Adams. The 5-foot-7 Cypress native put up 21 points on the Aggies while hitting a trio of 3-pointers.
“When we did not guard her correctly, she made us pay, right?” Taylor said. “We were supposed to go over the top of her on ball screens. Every time we went under, she stopped and she shot it. … I don’t know if we did a great job on her, but that being said, she is a great player, and we’re going to see players like her for the rest of the year.”
Turnovers — something which plagued the Aggies last season — continued to be an issue, as A&M recorded 10 turnovers in the first half.
Fortunately for the home squad, though, it was an issue for Tarleton State as well. The Texans finished the game with 20 turnovers of their own as A&M collected eight steals.
Ware said that if the Aggies pressed as hard as they did late in the game to start things off, those numbers could have been much higher.
“I think we kind of let them get into the flow of their offense, which is why they started hot from the beginning,” Ware said. “Like, we didn’t make it hard for them.”
Next, A&M turns its attention to a road trip to Manhattan, Kansas, where A&M will face its first Power Four opposition in Kansas State on Sunday, Nov. 16, at 1 p.m.
