Feb. 9, 2003
Final Stats
The Fighting Illini raced out to an early lead on Sunday vs. Iowa and held on to top the Hawkeyes 73-58 in front of 3355 at Assembly Hall. The Illini led by as many as 18 in the first half and endured an Iowa comback that sliced the lead to six in the final minutes. Aminata Yanni paced the Illini with a game high 17 points, 12 of which came in the first half. Yanni also led the team in assists with 4. Illinois sweeps the season series from the Hawkeyes after taking the game in Iowa City a week ago, 82-72.
Illinois jumped out to an early 13-7 lead after a Brittany Daugherty layup six mintues into the contest. They then extended their lead with a pair of big runs that busted the game open. The first one, an 8-0 run, was capped by an Yanni layup and pushed the Illinois lead to 12 at 25-13 with 6:45 left in the half. The second run saw the Illini outscore Iowa 11-2 over a span of 2:30 to extend the lead to 37-19 with just 1:58 remaining until the break. That run was also capped by a Yanni bucket, this time a 3-pointer. The Orange and Blue would go into halftime with a 37-23 lead.
In the second half, Illinois was able to stay in control and maintained a double digit lead for the first ten minutes. However, a 9-0 Iowa run cut the UI lead to just six, 56-50, with 8:51 to play. The Hawkeyes would get no closer though, as the Illini streched the lead back to double figures quickly and would never look back.
Cindy Dallas again came up big for the Orange and Blue. The senior from Pittsburgh, Pa. poured in 15 points and pulled down 8 rebounds to narrowly miss her fifth straight double double. Angelina Williams was the only other Illini in double figures, she scored 13 points and also grabbed 7 rebounds.
Johanna Solverson led Iowa with 13 points. Kristi Faulkner and Jamie Cavey were also in double figures with 10 points. Jennie Lillis led the Hawkeyes on the glass, she pulled down 8 rebounds.
Illinois (14-7, 6-5) shot 49.1% (28-57) on the evening while holding Iowa (12-9, 4-6) to just 37.5% (24-64) shooting from the field and 20.0% (3-15) shooting from behind the arc.
The Illini return to action on Thursday, Feb. 13, when they host UC-Santa Barbara at 7 p.m. in the Assembly Hall.
