Box Score As the calendar flips to February the games pick up importance with the schedule in full steam and the conference tournament looming in the not-so-distant future.

Looking to remain in the driver's seat in the OAC the John Carroll University women's basketball team picked up momentum in the second half to cruise to the 87-55 win over Muskingum in New Concord, Ohio on Saturday afternoon.

"Our big runs at the end of both halves were clearly huge for us," said head coach Kelly Morrone. "Those spurts were sparked by our defense which always gets us going."

John Carroll improves to 15-2, 10-2 OAC while Muskingum falls to 5-13, 3-9 OAC. JCU picked up its 10th OAC win for the first time since the 2007-08 season.

Fresh off her career-high 37 points, senior Missy Spahar had another active day offensively finishing with 29 points. The nation's leading scorer scored 16 points in the first half including JCU's first seven points of the contest.

JCU, who entered the weekend sixth national in free throw percentage converted 29 of their 31 attempts at the charity stripe.

Muskingum's Meghan Billick cut John Carroll's lead to eight with 13:33 remaining in the game but it was all Blue Streaks from there.
John Carroll ripped off a 7-0 run to open a 15-point cushion at 56-41 with 10:48 remaining in the game.

The Blue Streaks were not done.

With just over two minutes remaining a layup by AnneMarie Kirchner made it a 30-point John Carroll advantage.

The Fighting Muskies took a brief 16-14 lead with 12:15 remaining in the first half but the Blue Streaks stormed right back exploding on a 20-5 stretch to open up a 15-point advantage with 4:02 remaining in the opening stanza.

Emily Taylor poured in a career-best 18 points on the afternoon. Taylor also matched her career-high with seven rebounds and distributed five assists.

"Emily knocked down big shots right when we needed her to," said Morrone. "She works extremely hard so it was just a matter of time before she had a breakout game. She played controlled and within the system making her very efficient."

Joining Spahar and Taylor in double figures scoring was Katlyn Spahar who finished with 16 points.

Defensively, the Blue and Gold finished with 16 steals, three shy of their season-high.

The women's basketball team returns home to take on Heidelberg at 7:30 p.m. on Wednesday, Feb. 5.