Lyrell Barfield nets a career-high for the second straight game FAU’s womens basketball team used a career-high 25 points and seven steals from Lyrell Barfield to defeat Denver 70-56 at Magness Arena on Saturday afternoon. The victory is the third straight road win for the Owls and improved their Sun Belt road record to 5-2. Shes a great player, no question about it, said head coach Chancellor Dugan. Her teammates are really looking for her and trying to set her up for success. Anytime you have the unselfishness that we have, good things are going to happen. The transfer from Midland Junior College in Texas also knocked down a career-high six three-point field goals and went 9-of-19 from the floor in the victory. The first half was back-and-forth with no team holding a lead larger than six as FAU held a slim 31-30 lead at the break. The second half however was all FAU as the Owls (12-11, 8-5) burst out of the locker room on a 16-2 run over the first five minutes. The spark was capped off by a Carla Stubbs three-pointer to put FAU on top 47-32. The Pioneers (13-10, 8-4) cut the margin to 51-44 with 10:24 remaining but that was as close as Denver would get. Denver was led by Brianna Culberson who scored 18 points on 6-of-9 shooting including a 5-of-6 performance from the free-throw line. Britteni Rice also added 17 points for the Pioneers, who shot 55% from the floor in the game, but were plagued by FAUs aggressive defense that led to 28 points off turnovers. For Brittany Bowe, nine is the magic number. The senior point guard tied a season-high with nine assists and sits one-point shy of 1,000 for her career with 999. She was looking for shooters all night and drawing people to her on drives for kick outs, said head coach Chancellor Dugan. Bowe will look to crack the 1,000 point mark along with fellow senior Carla Stubbs (994) in FAUs next game on Wednesday night against Louisiana-Lafayette. Tipoff is scheduled for 7 p.m. eastern at FAU Arena in Boca Raton.
