After clinching the top seed in the conference tournament in their last game vs. USC Upstate, the Eagles earned the outright ASUN Regular Season Championship with a 74-60 win over Stetson.
Stetson was able to cut the Eagles’ lead to six late in the fourth quarter, but a pair of threes from Lisa Zderadicka and Rosemarie Julien iced the game with huge three-pointers to help secure the championship outright.
FGCU bookended their ASUN Play with wins over Stetson with a 38-point win and 16-point win on Saturday and will face NJIT in the first round of the ASUN Championship on Friday, Mar. 2 at 7 P.M.
Julien scored a game-high 25 points with Tytionia Adderly added 14 with eight rebounds. China Dow finished with 14 off the bench and Nasrin Ulel added 10. The Eagles had Erica Nelson back for the first time in nearly two games and played 32 minutes and led them with five helpers.
“We played a very good second half,” head coach Karl Smesko said. “Ty, Rose, and China all had big games. Winning the A Sun regular season championship was one of our goals and it feels good to get that accomplished.”
It was bit of a struggle early on for the Eagles as they gave up the first five points of the game and trailed by three at the end of the first half. FGCU shot 57 percent in the first half but missed six of nine shots in the second and turned the ball over 10 times.
The Hatters turned the ball over 14 times in the half, but out rebounded the Eagles 15-12 and scored 22 of their 25 points in the paint.
The Eagles sprung together for a strong third quarter, outscoring Stetson 26-14 to take a nine-point lead. FGCU continued to lead but Nelson, Adderly, Dow and Julien all had four fouls in the final minutes of the game. FGCU then finished the game on an 8-0 run in the final 2:32 to get the win.