Coward Ties 3s Mark as Bucs Fall to Liberty

Monday, January 16

11-6, 4-2BSC

Liberty

9-7, 4-1BSC

Team	1	2	F
LIBERTY	23	56	79
CHARLESTON SOUTHERN	26	38	64

1/16/2012 12:00:00 AM | Women's Basketball

Box Score

Box score

CHARLESTON, S.C. - Rachelle Coward buried nine three-pointers en route to tallying a career-high 32 points, but it was not enough as the Charleston Southern women's basketball team fell to Liberty, 79-64, at Buccaneer Field House on Monday night.

Coward tied the treys mark set last season by Katie Tull against Voorhees and fell one 3-pointer short of tying the Big South single game mark. Her 32 points rank as the tenth-best performance in program history.

Lakeitha Alston also finished the night in double figures for the Bucs, who were missing three starters for the contest. Alston went 7-of-13 for a total of 17 points, while Anicia Dotson and Shay Jones each added in five.

The Buccaneers shot 46.0 percent from the floor and went 13-for-31 for 41.9 percent from beyond the arc. Coward's 16 attempts from downtown also tie a CSU single-game record.

Preseason Big South Player of the Year Avery Warley paced Liberty with a double-double of 26 points and 13 rebounds, as the Flames snatched 20 offensive boards and finished with a 44-15 overall advantage on the glass.

CSU (11-6, 4-2) led by as many as nine late in the first half, holding the Flames without a field goal for nearly eight minute. However Liberty (9-7, 4-1) closed within three at intermission courtesy of a 6-0 spurt and took control in the final twenty minutes.

Back-to-back 3-pointers from Coward in a 40 second span kept the Bucs ahead in the opening minutes of the second half, but a shot from downtown by Devon Brown put Liberty ahead for the first time since 9:24 of the first half. Though Coward tied things up at 43-43, the Flames went on an 18-3 scoring run to take a 13-point advantage with 7:13 to go in the game.

The Flames had been limited to 41 percent shooting in the first stanza, but shot 60 percent in the second and netted 17-of-18 at the free throw line. The Bucs were able to cut the lead to seven on a 3-pointer by Jones, but an 8-0 run to close the game would assure the 79-64 win for Liberty.

The Bucs return to action on Saturday when they open up a two-game Big South road swing in Buies Creek against the Campbell Fighting Camels. Tipoff is slated for 1 p.m. in Buies Creek, N.C.