Lady Coogs Top Tulane

Sunday afternoon the Houston Lady Cougars trailed Tulane 33 to 25 at halftime. Instead of playing an awful second half (like they did Friday night versus UTEP), Houston began the second half with a 21 to 4 run and closed out the game with a solid 74 to 64 victory in front of 506 fans at Hofheinz Pavilion.

Houston's Twiggy McIntyre led all scorer's with 25 points (22 in the second half). The Lady Cougars shot 10 for 26 (38.5%) from the field in the first half and 22 for 44 (50.0%) in the second half.

"Shots started falling for us in the second half," McIntyre said. "We started taking better shots. We let Tye Jackson create for herself and others which was tremendous for us."

Tye Jackson scored 18 points and passed out a game-high 10 assists for her first double-double of the season and the 10th of her career.

"The second half, we ran out sets right," Jackson said after the game. "I really like to get to the ball to my teammates more than I like being a scorer; so, when I come off screens and I get trapped, I know somebody's open. So, that's when I try to distribute the ball to my teammates."

Two of Houston's freshmen, Cobilyn Hill and Courtney Taylor, played a key role in the win. Hill made all of her shots, 5 for 5 from the field and 2 for 2 from the foul line, to finish wit 12 points. She added five boards. Taylor scored 10 points (5 for 7) and pulled down a game-high seven rebounds.

"They're both great young players," said interim-head coach Danny Hughes after the game. "And, you have to understand their growing pains."

"Coach gave us a nice talking to at halftime," said Cobilyn Hill. "And, we just came out with more intensity."

"Courtney Taylor is a beast!" exclaimed Tye Jackson. "She has an all around game. I'm happy she's on our team."

The Green Wave missed seven straight shots to start to second half.

"I thought they came out aggressive in the second half," said Tulane head coach Lisa Stockton. "They made some shots and we missed lay-ups. We missed a couple lay-ups that were really gimmes. That hurt us. We had a couple of turnovers. I thought we had some high percentage shots that we missed."

Tulane (11-4, 1-1) pulled within three points (46 to 43); however Jackson made 3 of 4 free throws and assisted on a made three-point shot by Twiggy McIntyre to put Houston up by nine points (52 to 43) with 7:40 left in the second half.

Three minutes later, Jackson, while standing in front her team's bench, banked in a three-point shot to give UH a 61 to 50 lead.

With 1:30 left in the game, Ashley Langford swished a three-point shot to help Tulane trim Houston's lead to five points (67 to 62). However, Jackson and McIntyre combined to shoot 7 for 8 from the foul line to keep the Green Wave at bay for the final score of Houston 74, Tualne 64.

"In the second half, we knew had to put them away because we didn't want to start 0 and 2," said Courtney Taylor.

Houston improves to 1 - 1 in Conference USA and 7 - 9 overall.

"Once we got a good run on them," Coach Danny Hughes said. "I think our confidence built a little bit. I think the big effort today was defensively. I thought we did a great job."

Houston's next game is next Sunday, January 13, versus cross-town rival Rice. Tip is set for 2pm.