Texas A&M Women’s Basketball Powers Past Southern Miss

News release from Texas A&M Athletics:

PARADISE ISLAND, Bahamas – Jada Malone’s career-best 26-point effort powered the Texas A&M women’s basketball team to Monday’s dominant 79-57 victory over the Southern Miss Lady Eagles in Battle 4 Atlantis action inside Imperial Arena.
Malone recorded the second-best shooting percentage in program history for players with 10-plus attempts. She made 11-of-12 (91.7%) from the field and added 4-of-4 from the foul line. Malone tacked on seven rebounds, two assists and three steals.
Solé Williams and Aicha Coulibaly facilitated Malone’s success, combining for 14 assists. The Aggies registered a season-best 27 assists. Williams’ career-high and team season-high eight assists went along with 10 points and two steals. Coulibaly had six assists, eight points, seven rebounds and two steals.
Amirah Abdur-Rahim logged a season-high 14 points on 7-of-8 (87.5%) shooting from the field with four rebounds and one block.
Sahara Jones registered 11 points, seven rebounds, two assists and one block.
Texas A&M (4-4) owned a 42-24 margin in rebounding and an 18-4 edge in second-chance points.
Malone overwhelmed the Lady Eagles in the first half behind a perfect shooting performance. She was 8-of-8 from the field and 2-of-2 from the charity stripe en route to 18 points, four rebounds, one assist and two steals.
The Aggies inched out to a 9-4 advantage in the first three minutes of action capped off by a Williams 3-pointer. Southern Miss (2-5) responded with a 7-0 run to take an 11-9 lead at the 4:29. Malone’s jumper and layup resulted in an old-fashioned 3-point play and sparked a 10-0 run by the Aggies. The surge was only quelled by a buzzer-beating 3-point field goal by the Lady Eagles’ Trinity Rowe as the Maroon & White were ahead 19-14 at the first break.
Southern Miss knotted the game at 19-19 in the first minute of the second quarter, but the Aggies went on a 22-5 run. With Texas A&M up 32-24 at the midway point of the period, Abdur-Rahim made three consecutive buckets to inflate the cushion to 41-24 at the 2:21 mark. Malone closed out the half converting another and-one opportunity on a jumper and sinking a layup as the Aggies went into the intermission up 46-27.
Texas A&M continued to throttle up in the third quarter, opening a 28-point lead on three occasions. Southern Miss went on a 9-0 run in one last gasp, but Williams closed out the period with a jumper to take a 66-45 lead into the last break.
Southern Miss was unable to get back in the fray in the final quarter. The Lady Eagles trailed by 22 midway through the period and the teams alternated baskets down the stretch.
The Aggies return to the court Wednesday, Dec. 4 after the Thanksgiving break to take on Syracuse as part of the SEC-ACC Challenge inside Reed Arena at 6:15 p.m.
POSTGAME NOTES
RECORDS & SERIES NOTES
  • The Aggies are now 1-0 against Southern Miss all-time.
  • Joni Taylor’s career record moves to 172-112 all-time and to 32-37 in her three seasons with the Aggies.
TEAM NOTES
  • The second quarter (27) was the highest scoring period of the season for the Aggies.
  • The Maroon & White recorded 27 assists, marking a new season high for the team and the most for the program since 26 against Northwestern State on Dec. 28, 2020.
  • The Aggies matched their team high in points in the paint (46) with the two A&M bigs combining for 40 points and going 18-20 from the field.
  • Texas A&M began with a starting lineup of Jada Malone, Solè Williams, Janae Kent, Sahara Jones and Aicha Coulibaly (1-0).
INDIVIDUAL NOTES
Jada Malone
  • Scored a career-high 26 points and record the second-best shooting performance in school history, going 11-of-12 (91.7%) from the field (Minimum 10 shot attempts).
  • Led the team with three steals and made her first start this year.
Amirah Abdur-Rahim
  • Scored a season-best 14 points and went 7-of-8 from the field.
Aicha Coulibaly
  • Came up one assist (6) shy of matching her career high in dimes.
Solè Williams
  • Dished out a career-high eight assists and poured in 10 points for the second double-digit scoring performance of the season.
Erica Moon
  • Had a career-best four assists.

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