The TCU women’s basketball team is back to its winning ways. The Lady Frogs took advantage of the University of Nevada Las Vegas defense and were able to put together a few scoring runs in the first and second halves, keeping a comfortable lead, while on the way to an 87-57 victory, and 11th conference win of the season.

With a 34-23 advantage over UNLV (8-19) (4-10) to start the second half, the Lady Frogs could have tried to slow the game down. Unfortunately for the Lady Rebels that would not be the case. Five minutes into the second half, the Lady Frogs (18-10) (11-3) outscored their opponent 14-8. They pushed the lead up to 17, just 2 points shy of their biggest lead in the game.

Leading the Lady Frogs in scoring was freshman guard Helena Sverrisdottir. She led the scorers with 15 points and shot 5 of 7 from the field, draining 5 free-throws.

As a team, TCU was 16-20 in the first half and 32 of 38 for the game from the free throw line. The Lady Frogs did not miss a free-throw until there was 8:26 left in the first. The Lady Rebels only attempted 14 in the game.

“We were going to get there [free-throw line] a lot because we were in the bonus early,” said head coach Jeff Mittie.” “You convert on those and shoot them well it can really hurt the other team.”

Following the timeout, TCU’s defense turned up the intensity and held UNLV to zero points for four minutes. TCU forced five turnovers during the shutout and had a 54-31 lead with 11:52 left in the second half.

Complementing Sverrisdottir on offense was a great effort on defense from senior forward Lorie Butler-Rayford.

Rayford was a thief all game with 3 steals in the first and 5 steals for the game.

Rayford was used given significant defensive minutes guarding UNLV’s key player, senior guard Sequoia Holmes. Holmes leads the team and Mountain West Conference with an average of 18.9 points per game.

She was held to .333 shooting from the field, and had only 9 points.

“Lorie defended her very and did not give her anything easy,” Mittie said. “She did not get many free-throws and we forced her to become a jump shooter.”

TCU was able to get 30 points from inside the pain, giving the Lady Frogs good opportunities at having open looks from the outside. The team made seven of 14 3-pointers, including a 3 of 3 performance by freshman forward Emily Carter. Her final shot came with just over two minutes left, putting the nail in the coffin on their way to a 87-57 victory. She finished with 12 points.

“I think we executed in the first half well and grabbed a bunch of defensive rebounds,” Carter said. “We used that to get out on the break and a few times I was left open and unguarded out on the wings.”

In the first half the Lady Frogs had three different runs in which they outscored UNLV by 8 points or more. Its largest lead, 19 points, came with 5:43 left to play.

“We are playing well right now,” Cater said. “We know that the tournament is only a couple of weeks away and we need to be ready.”

The Lady Rebels did manage one run of the own. Red had a 5-0 run over a two-minute stretch late in the first half. They got the score back under ten for the time in over 10 minutes. But, they could not stop TCU.

It was just the Lady Frogs’ day.

The Lady Frogs out rebounded UNLV 38-28, made 18 more free-throws than UNLV attempted, and outscored them 46-18 on the bench.

“I think our whole team is just playing better basketball right now,” Mittie said. “Our bench is capable of scoring and playing at the level that we expect from the starters.

The Lady Frogs have only one home game left this season, Wednesday at 6:30, during senior night at Daniel-Meyer Coliseum.