Murray’s 23 Paces ‘Cats to 60-46 Win; Aleksandravicius Sets All-Time Blocks Record

Saturday, February 19

Davidson, N.C.

2:00 p.m.

Davidson College

12-15, 7-11SoCon

Georgia Southern

11-16, 8-10SoCon

Georgia Southern

Davidson

Photo by: Tim Cowie - DavidsonPhotos.com

Murray’s 23 Paces ‘Cats to 60-46 Win; Aleksandravicius Sets All-Time Blocks Record

2/19/2011 5:21:42 PM | Women's Basketball

Box Score

Gavin McFarlin -- Assistant SID

DAVIDSON, N.C. — Laura Murray (Harrisburg, Pa.) had her fifth 20-point game of the season with a game-high 23, Sophia Aleksandravicius (Pound Ridge, N.Y.) set the school's all-time record for career blocks with a pair and Davidson snapped a four-game skid in taking a 60-46 home win over Georgia Southern on Saturday afternoon in Southern Conference action.

Murray scored 13 of her 23 in the first half in leading Davidson (12-15, 7-11 SoCon) to a season-series split with the Eagles, who fell to 1-12 on the road (1-9 vs. the league). The Wildcats also halted their two-game losing streak in the all-time series.

The freshman guard was 7-of-9 from the field, including draining three of her four three-point attempts, and went 6-for-8 at the charity stripe. Davidson as a team missed just four of its 27 attempts for an 85.2 percent clip.

Aleksandravicius registered a season and career-high tying 16 rebounds to go along with 12 points for her seventh double-double of the year and 18th of her career. She had a career-best eight rebounds on the offensive side. Half of the sophomore's points came at the charity stripe as she ran her free throw consecutive streak to 13 straight.

In addition to her double-double, Aleksandravicius also set the all-time career blocks mark when with 3:23 left in the first half she blocked her 134th career shot to surpass Meghan Bryant, who finished her career with 133. She has already set the single-game (7 vs. North Texas) and single-season (85 and counting) records this year as a sophomore.

GSU (11-16, 8-10 SoCon) was led by Meredyth Frye's 12 points, while Jordi Cook came off the bench for nine points, all on three-pointers.

Leading 25-21 coming out of the halftime break, the Wildcats saw the Eagles score the first bucket of the second half to close within two. That would be as close as GSU got as Davidson took control of the game with a 17-6 run over the next seven minutes, and it was capped off by back-to-back triples from Murray and Ashley Lax (Little Rock, Ark.) to give the?Wildcats a commanding 42-29 lead with 12:13 left.

A pair of free throws by Murray with 7:33 left gave Davidson its biggest lead at 14 (47-33), and Lax would keep it at 14 a few minutes later on her second trey of the game for a 52-38 advantage. Lax finished with 12 points.

Both Murray and Lax sealed up the 14-point win by hitting two free throws each in the last minute and a half of the game.

It was a back-and-forth contest in the first half as there were 10 lead changes. Then tied at 21-all after a Lax jumper from the corner, Aleksandravicius netted the 'Cats' final four points of the half to give them a four-point advantage at the break.

Davidson continues its three-game homestand to close out the regular season when it hosts Furman on Monday at 7 p.m.

GAME NOTE: Aleksandravicius' had her 20th career 10-rebound game; she has had five in the last six games … she has tallied four double-doubles in the four of the last five games ... the forward is closing in on setting the single-season records in made field goals (173- 175 record) and free throws (108- 111) ... Murray has had three of her 20-point games at home where she is avearging nearly 15 points a contest ... Lax is 55 points away from reaching the 1,000-point mark for her career ... Kristen Johnsen matched her career-high with three blocks in the win ... Davidson took advantage of 16 Eagle turnovers, turning them into 20 points.