“Very proud of the effort of the entire team tonight,” Aggie head coach Mark Trakh said. “We played with confidence and played to the end.”
Junior guard and preseason All-WAC first teamer Sasha Weber led the Aggie brigade with a career-high 23 points on 8-of-12 shooting, eclipsing her previous career high by a single point. Weber also added four steals and four rebounds to her stat line.
Sophomore guard Moriah Mack also finished in double-figure scoring with 10 points while freshman Zaire Williams and sophomore Tamera William added eight points apiece.
“Sasha finally played the way she is capable of playing and Shanice Davis was great at the point guard position again,” Trakh said. “We are still continuing to improve and looking forward to the rest of the season.”
The Division-II Zias hung in with NM State during the opening portion of the game, actually leading 8-7 about three minutes into the matchup.
The Aggies would mark seven-straight points, however, including five-straight from Weber who led NM State with 12 points in the half, to open up a 14-8 advantage with 13:45 left in the first half. After a couple of ENMU free throws, NM State would score six-straight to double up the Zias at 20-10.
The Aggies continued to pad their lead throughout the second portion of the half and after two-straight buckets by sophomore forward Tyler Ellis in the paint, the home team’s lead had grown to over 20 at 43-20 with just over two minutes left in the half.
The lead would be 22 at 45-23 for NM State heading into the locker room.
The second half began with Weber marking her 13th and 14th points of the game after scoring the first bucket of the half 20 seconds in, and it seemed as though the only question remaining on the night was whether she would eclipse her career high of 22 points.
Consecutive 3-pointers by Weber and Williams increased the Aggie lead to over 30 at 62-31 midway through the final half. A couple of minutes later two free throws by Weber tied her career high. Another free throw with 6:03 left in the game gave the junior guard a new career high.
Sophomore transfer Kassandra Harris would sink a couple of late buckets in the paint and freshman guard Emily Hardin would mark her first points at NM State after hitting a couple of 3’s late as the Aggies cruised to a 28-point win.
Next up for NM State is the Rio Grande Rivalry as the Aggies meet rival New Mexico inside the Pan American Center on Sunday beginning at 2 p.m. NM State will try and break a 12-game losing streak to the Lobos which dates back to 2007. Sunday’s game will be televised by AggieVision on Comcast Cable channel 77 and will also be streamed for free on ESPN3. Fans attending the game are encouraged to wear white as the game will be a WHITEOUT game.