Troy University’s women’s basketball team secured a decisive 86-64 win over Arkansas State on Saturday at Trojan Arena, marking a significant response nearly ten months after being eliminated by the same opponent in the previous Sun Belt Conference Tournament.
The Trojans improved their record to 13-3 overall and 4-1 in conference play. The victory also ended Arkansas State’s 12-game winning streak and left Marshall as the only undefeated team in league play.
Troy’s defense limited Arkansas State, which ranks second nationally for three-pointers made per game, to just nine successful shots from beyond the arc out of 39 attempts, equating to a 23.1 percent success rate. Offensively, Troy shot 48.5 percent from the field and converted 85 percent of its free throws. Fortuna Ngnawo led with her eighth double-double of the season, scoring 21 points and collecting 10 rebounds—a performance that ties her with teammate Zay Dyer for most double-doubles in the conference. Kamesha Moore contributed off the bench with a career-high 11 points in her first game scoring double digits.
Arkansas State was led by Crislyn Rose, who scored 19 points on eight-of-15 shooting and added six assists. Mia Tarver followed with 11 points, including three three-pointers. The Red Wolves were held to just over 31 percent shooting overall and were outscored by Troy’s bench unit, which produced notable contributions across several statistical categories.
Reflecting on the team’s performance and preparation for this matchup, Head Coach Chanda Rigby said: “We wanted to be the team with the lowest number of turnovers on them all year, and we were. We wanted to outrebound them by a large margin, and we did that. We wanted to be locked in on defense because they try to get 40 to 50 threes a game. They were locked in at every turn. I appreciate coach Stephanie Murphy for doing our defense. She was unrelenting all week in preparation for this game and the points she wanted to make on defense. The team responded to it as well as any team could. We got put out of the Sun Belt Tournament by them last year, and that might have been a long time ago, but the wound is still fresh. The only way to heal that wound is to expose it and get back in control of that process and that is what we did tonight.”
Troy now holds an improved home series record against Arkansas State at 11-6 and leads all-time matchups between the teams at 18-14.
Next up for Troy is an away game against ULM scheduled for Wednesday, November 14 at 6:30 p.m.
Additional statistics from Saturday’s contest highlight individual achievements: Ngnawo has now scored in double figures in eighteen of her last nineteen games; Emani Jenkins recorded multiple three-pointers for her twelfth time this season; Shakirah Edwards led defensively with two blocks; Moore set new personal bests in both points scored (11) and field goals made (3). Of Troy’s thirteen wins so far this season, eleven have come by double-digit margins—including eight victories by twenty or more points.
