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SAN ANTONIO — Freshman Mannasha Bell scored 16 points, 10 of which came in the second half, to give UTSA a 61-54 win over Florida International for head coach Rae Rippetoe-Blair’s 300th career victory on Friday night at the Convocation Center.
The program’s winningest coach, Rippetoe-Blair now has 193 victories at UTSA.
Freshman Kamra King notched her second double-figure scoring game of the season with 10 points thanks to a 10-of-12 shooting night at the free throw line.
Meanwhile, Fanni Hutlassa scored a game-high 18 points to lead the Panthers (1-2).
Zsofia Labady made the game’s only 3-pointer to give FIU a 51-50 with less than four minutes to play. However, the trey proved to be the Panthers’ final field goal and the Roadrunners (1-2) responded with a 10-4 spurt to close the contest and record their first victory of the season.
Bell started the run with a pair of free throws to hand UTSA the lead for good twenty second later. Two more freebies from King along with inside baskets from sophomore Judy Jones and Bell pushed the lead to six, 58-52, with 1:36 left on the clock.
From there, FIU could only manage points at the free throw line. The Roadrunners defense turned up the pressure down the stretch and forced five turnovers in the final three and a half minutes, while limiting the Panthers to just two shots, both of which were off target.
In all, UTSA forced 22 FIU miscues and turned those mistakes into 25 points.
The Roadrunners jumped out to an early 6-0 lead in the first two minutes before the Panthers rattled off an 8-1 run for their first advantage of the contest. However, UTSA got back on top with six straight points from junior Whitney Wright and held the lead for the remainder of the half.
What proved to be the Roadrunners’ largest lead of the night came with 1:11 to play in the first half after a layup by junior Cori Cooper capped a 9-0 run. Wright scored all nine of her points in the opening period and UTSA led 32-24 at the break.
The Roadrunners will take to the road again next week when it faces UNLV (3-0) on Tuesday, Nov. 22, in Las Vegas, Nev. Tipoff is set for 7 p.m. (CT) at the Thomas & Mack Center.