Bowen Keys W. Basketball Win At Tulsa
TULSA, Okla. – The University of Arkansas women’s basketball team earned a gritty win Sunday afternoon on the road at Tulsa inside the Donald W. Reynolds Center. With a large Razorback contingent in the crowd, Arkansas improved to 8-2 on the season including 3-0 in true road games. The Razorbacks also picked up the program’s 700th win.
Senior Jhasmin Bowen owned the paint and dominated the backboards all afternoon long as she recorded her second double-double of the season and the sixth of her career, scoring 17 points on 6-of-9 shooting and grabbing 12 rebounds. Eight of Bowen’s boards were of the offensive variety as Arkansas held a significant edge in the second-chance points category, 18-0. Arkansas outrebounded its eighth opponent of the season, beating Tulsa on the boards, 47-32.
Sophomore Kelsey Brooks tied Bowen with 17 points and also pulled down seven rebounds. Sophomore Jessica Jackson chipped in 15 points, including a clutch three-pointer with 1:19 left to seal the win for Arkansas. Jackson also had eight rebounds and tied a career-high with five blocks.
Arkansas shot 45.8 percent from the field while holding Tulsa to 27.9 percent. While Tulsa shot 8-of-19 from behind the arc, Arkansas held Tulsa to just 9-of-42 shooting from inside the arc. Arkansas led for 38:05 of the game and much of it was by double digits but Tulsa’s three-point shooting kept Arkansas from opening up a much larger lead.
The Razorbacks jumped out to an early 10-5 lead on the road behind a combined eight points from Jackson and Brooks. Arkansas would not trail again in the first half, using an 8-0 run from the 15:21-12:54 mark to push the lead up to nine.
Arkansas also shot 50 percent from the field in the game’s first nine minutes. The times there was a miss, the Hogs were there to scoop up the offensive rebound as Arkansas pulled down 11 first half offensive boards leading to a 14-0 edge in second-chance points.
The turning point in the first half came at the 10:48 mark after Tulsa knocked down a triple to cut the Arkansas lead to 21-15. The Arkansas defense again showed its intensity, holding the Golden Hurricane to zero points over the next 9:22 while pushing its lead up to 12. In fact, Arkansas only allowed six Tulsa points the rest of the half as Arkansas held Tulsa to 21.9 percent from the field and took a 30-21 lead into the locker room.
Arkansas’ shooting percentage would cool down as the half wore on, finishing at 38.7 percent, as the Hogs shot were just 1-of-12 from three-point distance.
All nine Razorbacks saw the court in the first half, led by 10 points from Jackson and nine points from Brooks.
Opening up the second half, Arkansas was able to push its lead to as large as 15 with 15:19 left.
Behind 58.8 percent second-half shooting, the Razorbacks would remain ahead by double digits for much of the half. The Golden Hurricane cut it to eight with 6:18 remaining but that’s as close as they would come as Arkansas’ edge in the boards really showed through, limiting Tulsa’s second-chance opportunities and creating second-chance opportunities of their own.
Arkansas led by eight with 90 seconds left and after Tulsa saw a wide-open wing three rim out, Jackson came right back and nailed a three for the Hogs to take an 11-point edge and put the game out of reach.
The Razorbacks will be back in action Dec. 21 in Little Rock, Ark., to play Oklahoma as part of the SEC/Big 12 Challenge.
QUOTABLE
“Tulsa is a good offensive team, and they made 15 threes in their last ball game. I was hoping to hold them to six or seven and they end up making eight, but you know what, I’ll watch the film and I think two or three of them, we were right there in their face and contested and they knocked it in. When you look at it though, we held Tulsa to nine two-point baskets in this game. I think they were nine for 42 from the two point part of the floor and I think that’s because we stayed in a stance, we tried to stay in gaps, we try not to give you easy stuff. We rebounded the ball well, I think we probably should have beat them by 20 on the boards, we ended up not having that kind of an advantage. I know the goals are 10 feet high and everything is the same of the floor, but still we pick up another win away from Bud Walton Arena which is huge, because five out of our eight wins are away from Bud Walton Arena and that’s a good start to the season.”
POST GAME NOTES
* Arkansas has won 12 consecutive non-conference true road games, including 3-0 this season
* Arkansas improved to 19-2 all-time in the series against Tulsa
* Arkansas used the same five starters for the 10th time this season
* Sophomore Jessica Jackson finished with 15 points, the ninth time in 10 games she’s been in double figure scoring. She had 10 points at the break, the seventh time she’s scored 10+ points in the first half.
* Jackson tied her career-high of five blocks
* Senior Jhasmin Bowen recorded her sixth career double-double and second of the season as she scored 17 and grabbed 12 rebounds.
* Arkansas had three players score in double figures today (Jackson, Bowen, Brooks). Arkansas has had at least three players in double figures in every game this season.
For more information on Arkansas women’s basketball, follow @RazorbackWBB on Twitter.
