PHILADELPHIA – The St. Bonaventure women’s basketball team (15-2, 2-0 Atlantic 10) continued its best-ever road start to a season behind a team-high 20 points from senior Megan Van Tatenhove with a 74-65 win over Temple (7-8, 1-1 A-10) Wednesday evening at the Liacouras Center.
With the victory against the preseason A-10 favorite, Bonaventure owns the best road record in the entire nation at 7-0 and starts a conference campaign 2-0 for the first time since 2008-09.
Leading 14-12, the Bonnies – Receiving Votes in this week’s Associated Press Poll – went on a 13-0 run in just three minutes to open up a 27-14 advantage that they would not relinquish the rest of the night. That stretch included scores from five different Bona players – three free throws from Jessica Jenkins, a Van Tatenhove layup, a CeCe Dixon 3-pointer, a Chelsea Bowker 3 and an Alaina Walker fastbreak lay-in.
Horton finished with 15 points and six rebounds, while Dixon recorded double-figure points for the eighth time this year with a 12-point performance.
Temple, which along with Dayton split the 14 first-place votes in A-10 preseason balloting, never led. After the Owls tied the game, 2-2, at the 17:20 mark of the first half, the Bonnies led the remainder of the evening.
SBU took a 40-31 lead into the halftime break, with the 40 points tied for the most in an opening half this season by the Brown and White. The Bonnies extended that lead to 13 as it opened the second half with four straight points before Temple gradually climbed back into the contest.
The Owls cut the Bona lead to six on two occasions midway through the second half, but the veteran Bonnies responded and pushed their lead back to double figures, 55-45, at the eight-minute mark.
From there, the nation’s 15th-best free-throw shooting team knocked down 11-of-13 attempts from the free-throw line in the final five minutes to seal their league-leading 15th win of the campaign.
Van Tatenhove – who started her night by knocking down just her fourth 3-pointer of the year – scored 13 in the opening half and pulled down a team-best seven rebounds.
Kristen McCarthy led Temple at the offensive end with a game-high 21 points, followed by 17 from Shey Peddy and 14 from BJ Williams. After tallying 15 points in the first half, the Bona defense locked down on McCarthy in the second stanza, holding her to just six points.
Bona’s returns to action when they host Saint Louis on Saturday at the Reilly Center. Tipoff against the Billikens is set for 1 p.m.
Game Notes: Jenkins and Van Tatenhove both entered the contest with the same exact amount of career points (1,185), tied for 10th on the all-time scoring list … the starting lineup of Walker, Horton, Jenkins, Ortega and Van Tatenhove has not lost yet this year … Bowker finished with nine points, Jenkins with eight and Walker with six … sophomore Doris Ortega scored just four points but pulled down six boards and dished out a career-high-tying five assists … No. 5 Maryland, which plays at No. 11 Miami on Thursday, is 6-0 on the road this year … junior Jordan McGee and sophomore Ashley Zahn did not dress due to illness.
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