Boxscore

Kalamazoo Mich. - The Wayne State women's basketball team has high hopes for 2012-13, a strong start to coach Carrie Lohr's first season at WSU last year has the Warriors feeling this way. A 66-57 victory Friday night at Division I Western Michigan will make many believe in that sentiment.

The Warriors were gritty all night as they tipped off their season on the road. The first half was a back and forth struggle until Paige Sickmiller (Romeo, Mich.) knocked down triples on consecutive possessions to give Wayne State a 22-20 lead with 2:43 to play in the opening half. The Warriors would hang on to that lead as the first half buzzer sounded with a 26-25 WSU advantage.

The Warriors would retain that lead for pretty much the entire second half as the lead swelled to seven with 8:45 to play. Western Michigan would not go down easily however as the Broncos would quickly slice that lead to just one at the 7:01 mark.

The next five minutes featured strong defense by Juanita Cochran (Saginaw, Mich. / Arthur Hill) and Deanna Crumpton (Kentwood, Mich. / East Kentwood) and was capped off with Sickmiller again drilling a pair of long balls just one minute apart to give the Warriors their biggest edge of the game 63-51 with 2:13 to play.

Sickmiller led all scorers with 26 points including five three-pointers. Crumpton had 11 points and five rebounds while Cochran also had 11 points to go along with four boards and four blocks. Talisha Bridges (Kalamazoo, Mich. / Loy Norrix) was strong off the bench logging five points and four rebounds while only playing 16 minutes because of foul trouble.

Next up for the Warriors are the Toledo Rockets on Sunday at 2:00 PM. Toledo was selected to win the MAC West Division as well as picked to win the MAC tournament by the conference coaches on Wednesday.