
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: FRIDAY, January 7, 1994                   TAG: 9401070029
SECTION: SPORTS                    PAGE: B-7   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: By SCOTT BLANCHARD STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: BLACKSBURG                                LENGTH: Medium

TECH WOMEN ROMP

Aesthetics aside, all was well with the Virginia Tech women's basketball team Thursday.

"If it was ugly, we didn't care," said Hokies center Jenny Root.

Good thing. The Hokies missed a bunch of easy shots and committed some goofy turnovers but still crushed Morehead State 86-52 before a crowd of 525 at Cassell Coliseum, extending the best women's start in school history to 8-1 with their sixth consecutive victory. It was Tech's 17th consecutive victory at Cassell, also extending a school-record streak.

Tech pilloried a young Morehead team in the paint. Root led the Hokies with 16 points. Even though the Eagles (1-8) - who dressed eight players and played the last 11 seconds with four on the floor - seemed to stay in the game longer than they should have, Root said Tech was happy with a 17-point halftime lead.

Root said that's because the Hokies felt their previous two victories, by a point at home against Appalachian State and by six on the road against East Tennessee State, should have been blowouts.

"Twenty minutes is not that long," Root said of Morehead's ability to stay in the game for a half. "A whole 40-minute game is a lot harder."

The first 20 minutes were trying enough for Morehead's coach, Janet Gabriel. Disgusted with an official's call, Gabriel took off her white jacket and flung it into the first row of seats behind her team's bench.

The jacket was returned, but Gabriel's composure didn't. She earned a technical foul a bit later. That came in the middle of a 7-2 Tech run to end the first half; the Hokies added a 14-0 second-half run to push their lead from 68-48 to 82-48.

The Hokies shot 60.7 percent in the second half, doubling their halftime lead, as the Eagles made 29.4 percent of their field-goal attempts.

Tech forwards Angela Donnell and Christi Osborne combined to shoot 10-for-15 and score 24 points. Guard Sherita Joplin led Morehead with 18 points but missed 13 of 22 field-goal attempts.

The game had been scheduled for Wednesday but was postponed when Morehead, located in eastern Kentucky, couldn't make the trip across West Virginia because of snow.

by CNB