Union University’s women’s basketball team earned their second win of the season on Tuesday night, Nov. 18. The Lady Bulldogs played Rust College, out of Holly Springs, Mississippi. In a heated game, the team rallied hard and outscored Rust 86-66.
Natalie Smith, a junior public relations major and guard for the team, said that the girls have worked long and hard at this point in the season. She believes that their hard work throughout the preseason really helped them get the win.
“Going in we were all excited about tonight’s game. We’ve worked really hard in preseason and tonight was a good measure of how far we’ve come and how much more we have to work on,” said Smith.
Smith thought that the first half of the game was somewhat of a rocky start, but was glad to see her team pull out the win.
“The first half was kind of rocky. We came out in the second half and played a lot better,” said Smith. “It was great seeing us pull together as a team and fight hard and for each other. Kelsey Risner really stepped up and hit some big three’s for us as well, and that was great.”
Risner, a junior exercise science major and guard for the Lady Bulldogs, agreed with Smith about the night’s rough start. Risner said that though the win was good, there is always room for improvement.
“A win is always good. But this game showed us some of the things that we really need to get better at in order to play our best ball,” said Risner.
Risner said that prior to Tuesday the team scouted their opponent in order to find out what they need to focus and improve on in order to be ready for what was to come.
“We scouted them and we knew that they were going to be athletic. We tried to stick to our game plan and stop them from what they do best and then we really pushed for us to do the things that they struggle with defensively,” said Risner.
The next game for the Lady Bulldogs will be a non-conference game against Tennessee Temple on Saturday, Nov. 22 at home.
