The Grand Valley State women's basketball team came out of Sault Ste. Marie with an 82-43 victory over Lake Superior State on Thursday (Feb. 22) night. The Lakers scored 24 points in both the first and second quarters to take a 48-28 lead into the half. Coming out of the break, the Lakers outscored LSSU 22-7 in the third quarter, by which time sophomore Cassidy Boensch had already recorded her second double-double in as many games. GVSU cruised to the 39-point victory in the fourth quarter to improve their record to 22-5 overall and 15-4 against GLIAC foes. LSSU falls to 2-22 and 1-18 in conference play.
 
 
The Lakers shot a blistering 55.0% (33-for-60) from the field in their 82-point performance, including a 9-of-22 mark (40.9%) from beyond the arc while racking up 19 assists in the process. GVSU also limited themselves to just eight turnovers in the 40 minutes of game time, of which, LSSU converted into just two points.
 
Once again, the Lakers were getting after it on defense and it showed as Lake Superior turned the ball over 20 times, 14 of which were steals, which in-turn allowed GVSU to score 26 points off of those mistakes. Despite scoring just 43 points, the LSSU Lakers shot 37.5% from the field and an even higher mark on 46.7% from 3-point but GVSU did a great job of putting pressure on the LSSU offense all night, as they shot just 15 field goals compared to the Lakers 33.
 
Sophomores Cassidy Boensch and Jenn DeBoer both tallied a game-high 17 points while junior Natalie Koenig and fellow sophomore Maddie Dailey added 12 and 11 points, respectively. Boensch pulled down 11 rebounds to record her second double-double in a row and third total on the season, as well as blocking four shots and picking up an assist. Koenig led the squad with a game and season-high eight assists with DeBoer chipping in four as well. GVSU had 18 points scored from their bench, which was led by Megan Belke with six, and Emma Wright and Victoria Hedemark with five apiece.
 
Boensch got the scoring started with a couple of free throws but LSSU quickly anwered with back to back buckets to take the early 4-2 lead over the Lakers. The lead wouldn't last long however as GVSU would go on a 12-0 run over the next three and a half minutes to jump out to a 14-4 lead with 4:37 to go in the first. The run started with a Dailey jumper which was followed by a DeBoer triple, two Boensch layups, and finally a 3-pointer from Dailey once again. The Lakers built their lead up to 20-8 with about three minutes to go but LSSU would cut it to within six, 20-14, with 1:00 left before buckets from Hedemark and Koenig in the last :30 second would push the lead to 24-14.
 
GVSU opened the second quarter with a quick 5-0 run before Lake Superior would score four straight of their own to bring the score to 29-18. After going up 16, 36-20, with nearly five and a half minutes left, GVSU slowly continued to build up their lead and by the end of the quarter they were up by a 48-28 margin.
 
It would take just over four minutes for LSSU to score coming out of the break, meanwhile the Lakers kept their offense rolling, scoring nine in that same timeframe to go up 57-31. The bucket didn't kick-start the Lake Superior offense however and they would go nearly another three minutes before Rebecca Villanueva would draw a foul and hit both freebies to bring the score to 63-35 at the 2:14 mark. Layups from Boensch and Hedermark fell before Koenig closed out the third quarter with a triple with just :04 seconds remaining to push their lead to 70-35 heading into the final frame.
 
GVSU would score on buckets from Anya Smith, Belke, and DeBoer in the first half of the fourth quarter, while the Laker defense held LSSU to just a single 3-pointer, to put GVSU up 76-38. GVSU would outscore LSSU 6-5 over the remaining time and the Lakers would cruise to their 82-43 victory in the UP.
 
The Lakers will be back in action this Saturday (Feb. 24) as they are scheduled to take on Ferris State in their final regular season game of the year. Tipoff for that game is set for 3:00 PM. GVSU will have at least one more game in GVSU Fieldhouse Arena this season, as they secured a GLIAC Tournament Quarterfinal game for Wednesday, Feb. 28 at 7:00 PM. The opponent will be determined following the conclusion of the regular season this Saturday.