TALLAHASSEE-The North Carolina A&T women's basketball team worked hard to be the first MEAC team to take down Florida A&M this season, but came up short for the second time this season, as the Aggies fell to the Rattlers 68-63, on Monday night at the Al Lawson Center.
The Aggies played tough defense and were kept in the game by a 19-point, six-rebound performance from redshirt sophomore Amber Calvin. Calvin shot four 3-pointers in the contest and went 7-for-8 from the free throw line.
"Amber kept us in the game tonight. She does so many things," Bibbs said. "She plays with heart, and that's one thing she has is heart. Like everyone else, she wanted to win."
The Aggies (10-13, 5-5) defense was sound, holding the Rattlers (17-5, 10-0) to just 68 points, while collecting 48 rebounds, two blocks and 14 steals. The Aggies also forced 24 FAMU turnovers in the game. But the mistakes the Aggies made, which hampered their ability to take home their fourth straight win, came on the offensive end .
"You hold a team like this team to 68 points, you're right there with them. They scored one more point than us in the second half -it was offensive miscues," Bibbs said. "We'd get the rebound, miss shots, go back up and miss shots. We shot 34 percent, but they didn't do any better at 35, so our defense was great. But then too we just didn't capitalize on the opportunities. "
The Aggies struggled in the post against FAMU. Sophomore forward Tiffanie Adair went 3-for-10 while center Nikia Gorham went 3-for-9. Of the Aggie bigs, freshman Ariel Bursey performed well, tallying 11 points on 4-for-5 shooting.
"We've got to work on our post offense," Bibbs said. "They covered us a lot on some things that they did, and they kept doing it and we never could get away from it. We know that we're pulling the rebound down but they were going to (be aggressive with) you under the basket so the thing is you have to keep your composure."
Calvin hit her fourth 3-pointer of the game to cut the Rattlers lead to 52-50, but Tameka McKelton, Kimberly Sparkman and Antonia Bennett each hit their own shot from behind the arc to give FAMU its largest lead of the game at 11 with less than nine minutes remaining. Junior JaQuayla Berry made it a 62-54 contest with a pair of free throws with 6:36 remaining.
Bennett later made it a 64-56 game with a jumper. Calvin and Bursey both got to the free throw line in the dwindling minutes for the Aggies, but Qiana Donald hit two free throws to give FAMU a 68-59 advantage with 1:37 left on the clock.
The first half ended with the Rattlers up 39-35. The Aggies had a 12-10 lead at one point in the first half before the Rattlers went on a 7-0 run to pull ahead. Freshman Jessica Lyons hit a 3-pointer to snap a two-minute drought for the Aggies and make it a 17-15 game. FAMU sophomore Kimberly Sparkman ended the first half with 16 points for FAMU, including four 3-pointers. She ended the game with 19 to lead the Rattlers, who had three players score double figures.
"The first thing we said was, 'Make sure we take care of the basketball.' We did not take care of the basketball," said Bibbs. "We had an opportunity to win. They got in position to win and we didn't. We just didn't take care of the ball. We outrebounded them, we shot free throws well, we just made too many mistakes."
The Aggies return home for three games, the first of which will be on Saturday, Feb. 11 at 2 p.m. against S.C. State at Corbett Sports Center. The Aggies will be hosting ROTC Night on Saturday, welcoming the A&T Army ROTC and their high school recruit guests.
