Aggies go deep into bench en route to 80-38 handling of Prairie View
The No. 6 ranked Texas A&M Aggies throttled the Prairie View A&M Panthers 80-38 in a Wednesday night matchup on the court in College Station. The midweek match marks the Aggies’ twenty-first consecutive win over the Panthers in twenty-three tries.
Preparing for a brief break for Thanksgiving, the Aggies had plenty of reasons to celebrate as they improved to an undefeated 5-0 in regular-season play.
The Aggies looked solid on offense to start out the night, putting up 26 points in the first quarter to take control. With their offense rolling, the Aggies focused on pressuring the Panthers defensively. Falling behind early, Prairie View struggled to gain any momentum during the first quarter, shooting an abysmal 18.2 percent from the field and managing to amass only four points.
As the second quarter commenced, A&M continued to control the game with successful shots from Cheah Rael-Whitsitt, Kayla Wells, and N’dea Jones helping to build the Aggies’ lead. Prairie View’s offense appeared to settle in during the second period, snapping a nine minute scoreless stretch for the Panthers to gain some momentum. The Panthers put up 15 points in the second half, but the Aggies went 8-15 from the field, tacking on 20 points to give them the 46-19 lead at half.
A&M head coach Gary Blair was pleased with his team’s efforts and focus early in the game.
“We’re trying to get better every day. If we can stay as focused as we were to start this game — the score didn’t matter — but our intensity was outstanding on the press, rotating, helping out each other and with the communication on defense. That’s what we’re trying to peak for,” said Blair.
As the team returned from halftime, the Aggies came out hot, going 10-13 from the field in the third quarter. Standout guard Chennedy Carter was perfect in the third period, going 5-5 from the field and finishing the night with 20 points. In addition to Carter’s 44th consecutive double-digit performance, two other Aggies had a standout night. Center Ciera Johnson earned 10 points in an impressive performance and forward N’dea Jones went 7-10 from the field with 6 rebounds to finish the night with 16 points. It was a record night for Jones, whose 16 point game was a personal best for her in the Maroon and White.
With A&M solidly in the lead, the Aggies escalated their rotation of players on the court. Each of the 11 players on the roster spent at least 13 minutes on the floor, helping to provide players with experience and to build the team’s confidence.
“We had 11 kids with 13 minutes or more. That’s what we were trying to do today. It’s not trying to bury a team by scoring over 100 points—It’s giving those kids a chance that have worked hard. When we play those USCs, Rices and the Dukes a lot of times, we can’t play an 11 player rotation, but today we were able to. I think that some of them did a really good job, but they still need to continue to get better,” said Blair.
Rolling into the fourth quarter, the Aggies maintained a firm grip on their lead. A&M continued to smother Prairie View offensively, holding them to only nine points in the final quarter. With some fresh legs off the bench, the Aggies continued to create scoring opportunities as time wound down on the game, tallying more points to earn the Aggies the 80-38 win.
“I think our main focus as non-starters was to get in and improve on ourselves and get some quality minutes against a quality opponent,” said senior guard Jasmine Williams. “To show that we can keep up, not just maintain, but extend the lead and keep the continuity in substitution [was the goal]. I think we did that well. We had some drop-offs at times as subs, but with time comes experience.”
“Getting us minutes like this prepares us long term. It’s going to take all 11 of us to do what we need to do this year,” said Williams.
The Aggies will face a tough challenge in their next matchup as they are slated to take on No. 12 ranked Florida State on Sunday in Dallas.
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