By Nicholas Huenefeld/Owens Sports Information

Piqua, Ohio---Essence Cowan (Lima Senior/Lima, Ohio) and Kaylah Ivey (Westerville South/Westerville, Ohio) combined for 24 points as the No. 2 Owens Community College women's basketball team overcame a sluggish first half to pick up a 74-50 win over Edison State Community College on the road Wednesday.

With the win, Owens improved to 25-0 overall and 12-0 in Ohio Community College Athletic Conference (OCCAC) play. They will host Columbus State Community College in the SHAC on Saturday at 1 p.m. Edison fell to 17-8 overall and 7-6 in OCCAC play.

Despite scoring 10 of the game's first 12 points over the first four minutes, Owens saw Edison respond with a 13-3 run to take the lead and close the quarter. Things got better for Owens a short time later as Haili Mossing's (Evergreen/Metamora, Ohio) jumper two minutes into the second quarter knotted the game at 17 apiece. 

Two minutes later, Cowan and Sybil Roseboro (Elyria/Elyria, Ohio) drained back-to-back 3-pointers to give Owens a four-point lead. Jeryn Reese's (Mansfield/Mansfield, Ohio) first career 3-pointer with 29 seconds left pushed the margin to six, but Owens settled for a four-point lead at the break following Sydney Miller's last second jumper.

In that first half, Owens shot just 11-for-37 (29.7 percent) from the field and scored just 30 points, which tied its season low for a half that was set on Nov. 18 against Kalamazoo Valley Community College. Despite that, the Owens defense held Edison to 11 points in the second quarter and took a lead into halftime.

In the third quarter, Owens scored on its first four possessions. Two minutes later, the lead became 10 following back-to-back layups from Cowan and Olivia Frost (North Baltimore/North Baltimore, Ohio). 

Following a timeout, Riley Culver trimmed her team's deficit back to single digits with a pair of free throws. Owens, however, answered with a 10-0 run. Ariel Bethea (Huron/Ann Arbor, Mich.) added a steal and a fast break layup with 1:21 left to push the lead to 23.

In the third quarter alone, Owens held a 13-0 advantage in points off turnovers and an 18-6 margin in the paint. The bench also scored 16 points as the team shot 12-for-20 from the field (2-for-5 from 3-point range) and 6-for-7 from the foul line. All but one player scored in the quarter.

Neither team had much going in the final quarter. Edison pulled within as few as 18, while Owens led by as many as 26 with a minute left following a layup from Ivey.

Cowan (14) and Ivey (10) led Owens in scoring, while Ivey had a team-high 11 rebounds. Reese added nine points, 10 rebounds and three blocks. Roseboro and Courizma Williams (Hughes/Cincinnati, Ohio) each also had nine points, while Roseboro chipped in a game-high seven assists, along with five rebounds and two steals.

Miller led Edison with 18 points, while Carly Buzzard had six points and a game-high 14 rebounds.

NOTES

Owens completed a season sweep of Edison with the win. They defeated Edison 97-60 on Jan. 18 in the SHAC.

Reese now has 829 career points. She needs nine more to pass Ashley Tunstall (837, 2013-15) and Robin Nesper (837, 1995-97) for 10th on the career scoring list. On top of that, she also eclipsed 600 career rebounds on Wednesday and is 55 shy of breaking the program's career mark.

One game after reaching 600 career points, but having her seven game streak of five or more steals snapped, Bethea had her streak of 20 straight games scoring in double figures snapped. However, she grabbed seven steals to start a new streak, and she now has 123 steals this year and 220 in her career - both of which are already records.

Following yesterday's win, Owens has now won 39 straight regular season games dating back to Jan. 6 of last season, along with 46 straight regular season conference games dating back to Feb. 8, 2014. The team will also take a 70-1 home record since February of 2012 into this weekend.

Owens still sits just one 100 point game away from breaking the single season team record for most in a season. They already have nine this year, which ties the record set by last year's team.