Dec. 31, 2005
Box Score
ARLINGTON, Texas - Less than 24 hours after suffering a heart breaking loss at TCU, Texas-Arlington overcame an early hangover as Tojjinay Thompson sparked the Mavs by scoring all 16 of her points in the first half as UTA won its home opener 75-57 over Cornell Saturday afternoon at Texas Hall. The victory helped stretch the nation's sixth longest active home-court winning streak to 20 games.
Career-highs were spread around on Saturday as Ashley Bobb poured in a career-best 17 points and Terra Wallace tied her career-best with eight assists. Freshman Jamie Buxkemper, seeing her first action in nearly a month, dished out five assists, had four steals and pulled down four rebounds.
CU (3-8) started the game hot from long range as Gretchen Gregg, Lindsay Krasna and Kaylee Fitzsimmons hit three straight triples to stake the Big Red to a 9-0 advantage.
UTA (6-5) responded with a run of its own as Thompson sparked a 17-0 spurt with a putback basket and a triple from the left corner. Melanie Lane got into the act with a jumper from the left elbow and Maryann Abanobi added a three-pointer. Buxkemper then ripped off a steal and fed a streaking Thompson for a layup. The run ended with a Wallace three-pointer and a Bobb jumper off a feed from Buxkemper.
Following a Big Red basket, UTA would score the next six points to open up a 23-11 advantage with 10:13 left in the half.
The Big Red would then crawl back into the game as they would get a three-pointer from Fitzsimmons at the 4:24 mark to pull within five at 27-22.
UTA would regain the momentum the remainder of the half as a three-pointer from Ashley Bobb and five points from Thompson helped push the advantage back to double digits. The Mavs would take a 14-point lead into recess as Wallace would steal the ball near midcourt and drive all the way in before closing out the half with a three-pointer.
The lead would quickly grow to 20 points in the second half as Bobb converted a trey and Buxkemper nailed a three after causing a turnover. UTA would maintain its lead through the first nine minutes of the half and it grew to as many as 23 points on Bobb's third three of the game.
CU would pull back to within 15 points at the 4:52 mark as Jeomi Maduka scored 10 of her game-high 18 points in the second half. UTA would respond with an Abanobi three-pointer and baskets from Candice Champion and Bobb to push the lead back to 20 points before clearing the bench and winning by an 18-point margin.
Bobb's career-high led four Mavs in double as Thompson had 16, Wallace 14 and Abanobi 11. Bobb led the team on the glass with nine rebounds.
UTA finished the game by going 12-for-26 (.462) from behind and 29-for-61 (.475) from the floor overall.
The Mavs return to action Jan. 5 as they begin their defense of their Southland Conference championship on the road against Northwestern State. Tip-off is set for 7 p.m. at the Prather Coliseum.
