PHILADELPHIA, Penn. — Kia Nurse scored 24 points and freshman Megan Walker added a career-best 22 to help No. 1 UConn rout Temple 113-57 on Sunday.
The Huskies (18-0, 7-0 American) were missing Katie Lou Samuelson, who was out with an ankle injury she sustained against Tulsa on Thursday.
It’s been a rough week for the junior forward. She was still sporting a blackened left eye after taking an elbow to the face against Texas on Monday.
UConn also was having a rough week, not playing up to its top ranking. The Huskies beat Texas by four points and then had a lackluster 18-point win over Tulsa that left coach Geno Auriemma extremely annoyed with his team, calling that game one of the worst performances he’s seen in his 32 years coaching.
Sunday’s game didn’t get off to a good start for UConn with Temple (9-9, 1-5) scoring the first six points of the game.
Then UConn got going. Nurse and Walker helped UConn to a 28-18 advantage after one quarter and a 24-point lead at the half, much to the delight of the sellout crowd, which was mostly pro-UConn and included Auriemma’s mother.
The Huskies kept the rout going in the second half, hitting eight of their first nine shots and scoring 34 points in the third quarter — the most this season by UConn.
It was 90-43 after three quarters and Azura Stevens’ three-point play with 6 minutes left in the game got the Huskies over the 100-point mark.
It was the fourth time this season the Huskies passed 100 points in a game and the most they’ve scored in an American conference game.
Mia Davis scored 19 points and Tanaya Atkinson added 15 to lead the Owls, who have dropped six of their past seven.
HONORING SUMMITT: UConn wore shirts in honor of former Tennessee coach Pat Summitt, who died in 2016. Since the 2011-12 season schools across the country have been helping raise awareness of Alzheimer’s that Summitt suffered from.
TIP-INS:
UConn: The Huskies have won 114 straight road games against unranked opponents. The last loss came on Dec. 21, 2004 at Arizona State. … Auriemma has never lost to a team that is led by a former Huskies player or coach, improving to 34-0. Temple coach Tonya Cardoza, who was a longtime UConn assistant, has 10 of those losses. … The victory was UConn’s 147th straight against a non-ranked opponent and also kept it unbeaten in the American Athletic Conference since joining with 77 regular-season wins and all four conference championships.
Temple: The Owls honored former standouts Dora Lurie and Donna Kennedy by putting them into the school’s ring of honor at halftime. Lurie was captain of the teams that won 67 consecutive games in the early 1920s. Kennedy finished her career in 1983 as the school’s all-time assist leader.
UP NEXT:
UConn: at Memphis on Wednesday.
Temple: hosts Penn on Wednesday in a Big Five matchup.
