BOONE, N.C.- Appalachian State University women' s basketball continued with its winning ways Thursday evening, as the Mountaineers pelted their non-conference foe UNC Asheville 99-71 at the Holmes Center. to win their 11th straight home contest. The win pushes Appalachian to a stout 6-1 record, its best start to a season since the 1994-95 campaign and drops the Bulldogs to an even 3-3 overall.
Similar to Monday's contest, it was a 13-4 run in the early minutes of first-half play that UNC Asheville could never recover from and put the Black and Gold in command for good.
Action was knotted just two minutes into play at five apiece, before Appalachian's productive offense came alive and four points by Anna Freeman in addition to a trey by Sam Ramirez helped make the score 18-9 in ASU's favor.
Ramirez would not let up as she scored nine points over a ten-minute span increasing the Apps' lead to 35-17.
The lone senior scored in double-figures for the sixth time this season, totaling a team-best 22 points on 8-14 shooting from the field, including going 4-7 from behind the arc. With her four made treys, Ramirez is now just three-three pointers away from becoming ASU's all-time leader in three-pointers made.
After the Bulldogs cut their deficit to as close as 13 points, Appalachian countered and was relentless on the offensive front, closing out the first half outscoring UNCA 14-5 to go into the break up 53-31.
Anna Freeman and Kelsey Sharkey began the Mountaineers scoring in second half play, and an Ashlen Dewart layup gave ASU its largest lead of the contest up 30 points.
The trio finished the contest in double-figures, with Sharkey recording her first double-double of the season and just the second of her career, grabbing a game-high 11 boards and scoring 10 points. Freeman had 16 points on the night as well and Dewart was also stellar scoring 21 points in 21 minutes of action.
15 second-half made free throws by UNCA along with offensive efforts by Lindsey Thompson let UNCA hang around, but ASU proved to be too much and improved to a spotless 2-0 on the season against Big South teams, rolling to the 28-point win.
Thompson closed out the contest as the leading scorer, scoring 29 points, including draining five three-pointers.
In perhaps its most-anticipated non-conference game of the season, Appalachian now returns to the road to play Atlantic Coast Conference opponent Maryland. The game is slated to tip at 2 p.m., Sunday, December 5 in the Terrapin's Comcast Center.
NOTES: ASU is now on an 11-game home and four-game winning streak… ASU moves to a perfect 2-0 against Big South teams this season … six Mountaineers ended the game in double-figures scoring for the first time since January 4, 2003 against Furman … the Black and Gold had a season-low 12 turnovers against UNCA … the win is Appalachian's first to start the month of December since December 2, 2004 when it beat Coastal Carolina.
