Three University of Tennessee at Chattanooga women's basketball players finished with double-doubles Saturday, and the Lady Mocs handled Elon's press in an 83-64 Southern Conference win at McKenzie Arena.
Redshirt freshman Michelle Davis had the best game of her young career with 20 points and 19 rebounds in 30 minutes off the bench. It was the most rebounds by a UTC player in more than a decade.
"I didn't realize I had that many -- shocker," Davis said following the Lady Mocs' 11th straight win, and their first by double figures since a 64-53 win over the College of Charleston on Jan. 2.
Jenaya Wade-Fray had a game-high 21 points and 10 rebounds, while Shanara Hollinquest added 14 points and 10 rebounds despite sitting for long stretches due to foul trouble.
"Obviously Michelle Davis stepped up with Shanara in foul trouble, and M.D. just did an unbelievable job on the boards and then scoring," UTC coach Wes Moore said. "We've got a lot of people right now that are contributing, and that's good."
Avenging their last loss, 74-66, at Elon on Dec. 17, the Lady Mocs (16-6, 11-2) remain alone in first place in the SoCon standings.
In that first meeting, Elon (8-14, 3-10) scored 24 points off 25 UTC turnovers. Saturday, the Lady Mocs did a much better job against Elon's full-court press, committing just 13 turnovers and scoring 25 points off Elon's 16 giveaways.
The Lady Mocs were in control of the game nearly from start to finish -- they led 42-26 at the half -- but there was one stretch midway through the second half when the press started to give them problems. Other than that, Moore said, he liked how UTC took care of the ball.
"Hey, when this team can go with 14 assists and 13 turnovers against a full-court press every time it's a dead ball or made bucket, I'm pretty pleased," he said.
Foul trouble limited Hollinquest to 24 minutes of action, but she did have 12 points and seven rebounds in the second half. Facing double- and triple-teams nearly all the time the past few games, which has limited the SoCon's leading scorer and rebounder's production, she said it was important that she have a good stretch like she did.
"I think it was important for the team and for me," she said. "As long as my teammates are knocking down shots, I'm still happy."
The Lady Mocs did that and had plenty of open looks after beating Elon's press. In fact, in the second half when their lead was around 20 points, they might have had too many open looks. Those are hard to pass up in 3-on-2 situations, which is why UTC sometimes put up shots with more than 20 seconds left on the shot clock.
"That's what's tough about it," Moore said of the press. "You want to burn them. If they're going to gamble and have everybody up there, you want to make them pay for it. But then it becomes an issue of time management and knowing when to back it out and eat some clock."
The Lady Mocs, who never led by less than nine in the second half, host UNC Greensboro on Monday.