East Peoria, Ill.---The #11 ICC women's basketball team used a stellar effort on the boards to earn a 71-56 win over Lewis & Clark in M-WAC and Region 24 action on Wednesday night at Ramsey Gym.  The Cougars held a 41-24 rebounding edge (17 offensive) to score their 20^th win of the season, marking the 10^th consecutive season of 20 wins and 46^th time overall (in 52 years).  ICC's record now stands at 20-9 overall, 10-3 in Region 24, and 8-3 in the M-WAC. 

The Cougars held LCCC scoreless on their first eight possessions to take an 8-0 lead on scores from Kayla Gordon, Courtney Jones and a three-pointer from Cierra McNamee at the 7:30 mark.  ICC kept rolling as Kyleigh Block had two scores, Gordon hit a jumper, and Courtney Jones nailed free throws to put ICC up 19-8 after the first quarter.  

After a Peyton Dearing trey, the Trailblazers went on a run to draw to within 23-19, but Dearing took a charge to reignite and reset the Cougar defense.  Offensively, McNamee slithered in the paint for three scores to put the Cougars up 29-23 followed by an Edwards floater, steal and layup and then Jones pushed the lead to double digits with a put-back to put ICC up 35-25 at intermission.

The Cougars shared the ball well in the third as Jones hit McNamee for a score and Mitchell and Gordon hit long-range bombs (assists Gordon and Dearing) to go up 45-30.  McNamee swatted a Trailblazer shot that Dearing recovered and cashed in for a layup and then Dearing took two charges over the the next two minutes to keep the defense on point.  Jones found T'yana Lovelace and Keijah Gray for post-ups inside and Edwards hit Lovelace for another score to put ICC up 53-36 at the end of three quarters.

ICC got hot from downtown to start the fourth, hitting four three-pointers in the first five minutes (Dearing-two, Jones, and Laisha Armendariz-Lopez) and Mitchell and Gray added rebound put-backs to grab the hosts' largest lead at 69-43 with 3:34 to play.  LCCC closed the game on a 11-2 run to close the gap for the final score.

Leaders:
Cierra McNamee | 15 pts, 5 reb, 2 blks
Peyton Dearing | 11 pts, 3 chgs tkn 
Courtney Jones | 10 pts, 7 reb, 6 asts
Kristyn Mitchell | 8 reb, 5 pts
T'yana Lovelace | 6 pts, 6 reb
Derria Edwards | 4 pts, 3 asts
Kyleigh Block | 4 pts, 3 asts

Next up:
The Cougars will play their last regular season game this Saturday, February 26 against John Wood at 1:00 pm at Ramsey Gym.  The ladies will host the team's 2^nd annual "Be the Change" game as they promote diversity by wearing "Be the Change" shirts as their shooting shirts.  The team will also recognize their sophomores in a brief ceremony at 12:45 pm.  

Live-stream will be on the ICC Athletics' YouTube Channel; audio can be heard with Alex Staab at mixlr.com/ICC-Womens-Basketball.

Region Tournament Information:  
Seeds for the Region 24 tournament will be computed at the completion of Saturday's final regular season games. The Cougars have already secured one of the top 4 seeds for the tourney so will be hosting a quarterfinal game on Wednesday, March 2 at Ramsey Gym.  Wednesday's game time and opponent will be released by Sunday, Feb. 27.
Semi-finals and the championship game will be at John Wood CC (Quincy) on March 5-6.