MONROE, La. — UL junior guard Brandi Williams picked the perfect time to get back on track.
With senior center Ty’Reona Doucet out after spraining her ankle in Thursday’s home win over UL-Monroe, Williams helped the Ragin’ Cajuns overcome a six-point deficit after three quarters by scoring a career-high 32 points to lead UL to a 64-59 victory over the Warhawks on Saturday at Fant-Ewing Coliseum.
“She came up big,” UL coach Garry Brodhead said. “Brandi’s a shooter, man. That’s what we’ve been trying to preach. We want her to take her shots. She’s been struggling a little bit. For her to come out and start like she did — she got in some early foul trouble on, but she stuck with it.
“I thought she was really aggressive to the goal today. We haven’t seen that in a while. I think that’s what we need from Brandi.”
The victory extended UL’s school-record winning streak to 11; the Cajuns improved to 12-5 overall and 11-1 in Sun Belt play. ULM (2-16, 0-12) was trying to nab its first league win of the season.
The Cajuns will stay on the road with an opportunity to clinch the Sun Belt West crown next weekend at UT-Arlington beginning at 7 p.m. Friday.
Williams scored those 32 points on 9-of-15 shooting overall, 5 of 7 from 3-point land and 9 of 9 at the line.
Doucet’s absence showed up in the rebounding totals with ULM winning that category 36-24.
The other big obstacle the Cajuns had to overcome in the game was Makayia Hallmon struggling offensively after scoring 24 points in Thursday’s win over ULM. This time around, she only made 1 of 12 attempts from the field for three points.
Of course, that one basket was a three-point play with 1:05 left to play to give UL a 61-57 lead.
The free-throw line was critical to UL’s win. The Cajuns made 20 of 24 attempts from the line, compared to just 5 of 7 for ULM, largely because the Cajuns were only whistled for 14 fouls.
“We’re getting better at it,” Brodhead said about limiting fouling. “That’s one of the things that we weren’t doing so good early in the season. We were putting too many people at the line. We talked about it and worked on it in practice. Quit grabbing and hand-checking. You can see the youngsters are growing up. Mae Mae Hallmon did a great job on the defensive side.”
ULM outscored UL 15-6 in the third quarter, largely due to the shooting of Kiera Brimzy, who finished with 23 points and five rebounds.
“In the third quarter, we decided not to press and we just couldn’t guard them in the halfcourt,” Brodhead said. “So fourth quarter, we just came out and did what we do.”
Skyler Goodwin finished with nine points and Kim Burton eight.
“We found ways to score, and our defense is always going to be there,” Brodhead said. “We just have to do a little better job on the inside.
“It’s all about improving and getting better every day. Even though it didn’t show up in the score, I thought we got better today.”
