WINONA, Minn. – Senior Connor Nagle continued her 3-point show Friday night, setting a career-high with eight triples and finishing with a game-high 26 points to lead the No. 9 Winona State women's basketball team to a 69-61 win over Minnesota State in front of 1,023 fans in McCown Gymnasium.
Nagle became just the third different player in WSU women's basketball history to hit eight 3-pointers in a single game. It's one shy of the program record of nine, set by Becca Friestleben in 2013. Friestleben also hit eight in a game the same year, while now-assistant coach Ana Wurtz also sank eight 3-pointers in 2010.
Seven of Nagle's 3-pointers came in a stellar first half for the Preston, Minn. native – who scored her number, 23, in the opening 20 minutes. Her first gave the Warriors an early 7-5 lead and hit back-to-back late in the first quarter to pull her team ahead 17-10. Nagle would hit three more in a 2:10 span midway through the second quarter to push the lead to double digits at 32-22 and Alexis Foley hit one of her own to push it to 13 points, which would be the largest of the game.
While Nagle was held to just three points in the second half – her eighth and final 3-pointer – she did just enough to lead her team to its eighth straight win and tie the program record with its 24th win of the season.
It wasn't easy down the stretch as the Mavericks twice pulled within two, with the last coming on a Sammie Delzotto jumper that cut WSU's lead to 63-61 with 36 seconds remaining. But the nation's leading free throw shooting team iced it at the line, as Foley, Roelofs and Foley again went 6-for-6 to earn the 69-61 win.
Hannah McGlone recorded her third double-double of the season with 16 points and 13 rebounds on 7-of-9 shooting. Foley finished with 14 points despite 3-of-12 shooting, but was a perfect 6-of-6 from the line, dished out four assists and tallied a pair of steals.
Winona State (24-2, 17-2 NSIC) plays for a program-record 25th win and the opportunity to clinch its first NSIC championship in program history Saturday when it hosts Concordia-St. Paul at 4 p.m. in the regular season home finale in McCown Gym.
