Hot start leads Marquette past Newark, 58-27

NEWARK — The Marquette girls basketball team came into Wednesday’s game against Newark on a two-game losing streak and looking to get back into the win column.

Mission accomplished.

The Crusaders — behind sophomore guard Kaitlyn Davis' 23 points, 16 in the first quarter — pushed out to a 15-point lead and eventually posted a 58-27 victory over the Norsemen.

“We were coming off a tough loss at Roanoke on Monday in a back-and-forth game and had dropped one at La Salle-Peru on Saturday, so we came in tonight just wanting to get back on the winning side of things,” Marquette coach Eric Price said, his squad now 10-7 on the season. “This time of year, when you have multiple games in a few days, you can’t really dwell on bad games, and I thought we came here ready to go. Hats off to Newark though, they played hard the entire game.”

Davis opened the scoring 45 seconds in with a floater in the lane, then her individual six-point burst put the visitors up 13-2 midway through.

A layup by Newark’s Olivia Smith snapped the run, but a steal-turned layup, plus two triples by Davis, a three-point play by Hunter Hopkins and a drive by Chloe Larson extended the Crusaders lead to 26-9 heading to the second quarter.

“I thought we played a solid game,” Price said. “We got up and down the floor well, we defended well, we rebounded well, and we made shots, especially in the first quarter, to give ourselves a pretty good lead the rest of the night. It was nice to be able to get everyone off the bench in and have them get some good minutes.”

Marquette led 35-13 at half and 48-22 going to the fourth quarter.

After Davis, who was 9 of 15 from the field, Hopkins finished with nine points, four assists and three steals. Larson and Kelsey Cuchra each added seven points, the latter also grabbing a game-high 14 rebounds and blocking a trio of shots.

For Newark (1-11), which has nine underclassmen on its 13-player roster and committed 29 turnovers for the game, Smith had nine points and four rebounds, Jade Mitchell eight points and nine rebounds, and Presley Hauge five points and five rebounds.

“I know we are 12 games into the season, but many of these girls are still trying to adjust to the pace of varsity basketball,“ Newark coach Jasmine Mitchell said. “We are getting there, but it’s small steps. Most of our games this season we’ve played better as the game has gone along, adjusted to the speed of everything, and that was the case tonight. We were more consistent from start to finish then we have been all season.

“This was actually one of the best first quarters we’ve had this season as far as scoring, but we just had way too many turnovers and then Davis got hot. We didn’t come out timid, we were aggressive and doing a lot of the good things we talk about all the time as far as how, whether you’re a freshman, sophomore or first-year senior, you have to play as a varsity player.”

Both teams are right back in action on Thursday as Marquette is at Henry-Senachwine for a Tri-County Conference game, while Newark is at rival Serena for a Little Ten Conference contest.