DURHAM – When the North Carolina A&T women's basketball team plays against arch-rival N.C. Central in Durham many may consider it a homecoming game for Raleigh native Aprill McRae considering the two cities share an airport, the Research Triangle Park and a national identity as the Raleigh-Durham area.
Whether it is a homecoming game is up for debate, but one thing is for sure the graduate center certainly treats it as a homecoming. McRae had another superb game in McDougald-McLendon Gymnasium Saturday afternoon to lead the Aggies to a 76-54 win over the Eagles.
McRae finished with 21 points and eight rebounds on 10-for-16 shooting. It was McRae's third and final game in McDougald-McLendon where she has scored 54 points, grabbed 21 rebounds and shot 55 percent (23-for-42) from the floor.
“She loves the crowd,” N.C. A&T head coach Tarrell Robinson said about McRae's performances at N.C. Central. “She has been talking about playing at North Carolina Central the past two days during our preparation. She talks about how the fans are always getting on you, and I think she feeds off that.”
Dana Brown, a graduate of Enloe High School in Raleigh, had 17 points on 4-for-7 shooting from 3-point range. Kala Brown, who started at point guard in place of Christina Carter who was out, had 11 points, five assists and just one turnover. Thirteen different Aggies scored on Saturday.
The Aggies have now won 11 straight games over the Eagles, and Robinson is 7-0 against Eagles. His team has won those games by an average of 20.5 points. The Aggies (11-10, 7-3 MEAC) are above .500 for the first time this season.
It took N.C. A&T a little while before it took control of Saturday's contest. But it didn't take the Aggies long to enforce their game plan – give the ball to McRae in the post. McRae connected on her first four shots and was 5-for-6 in the first quarter to help the Aggies take an18-14 advantage when the first quarter ended. The Eagles (3-16, 2-8 MEAC) opened the second quarter with a layup from Tisha Dixon to cut N.C. A&T's lead to two. The Aggies grew their lead exponentially from there.
Brown capped off a 9-2 N.C. A&T run with a 3-pointer with 4:04 remaining in the half to give the Aggies a 27-18 lead. Three-and-half minutes later Brown hit another three to help the Aggies go into the locker room with a 34-24 halftime lead. An 11-2 run to open the half ended with yet another Brown 3-pointer as the Aggies took a 45-28 lead at the 6:35 mark of the third quarter. The Aggies would lead by as many as 28 in the game.
“It's huge,” said Robinson about McRae getting off to fast starts. “We always want to start the game getting the ball to Aprill, which is going to open up shots for Dana Brown and our other guards. Every game we go in that's our game plan.”
N.C. A&T's next game is seven days away when they host Florida A&M, 2 p.m., Saturday at Corbett Sports Center. Robinson will use that time between games to stress closing out games.
“The same way we got the lead we have to be able to consistently maintain it,” said Robinson. “We made some mistakes offensively that made the lead smaller than it should have been.”
