Playing in the familiarity of the friendly confines of the Daniel 'Chappie' James Center proved to be enough for the Tuskegee Tigerettes to win their first game of the season in their home opener on Tuesday night.  The 68-47 victory also happened to be the first victory under the new regime of Tuskegee Coach Tarsha Askew.  After a low-scoring half, which led to a deadlocked halftime score of 26-26, a solid defensive effort by the Tigerettes forced West Alabama to shoot just 28 percent from the field in the second half.

"They were determined not to lose at home, and do better than what they've been doing," Askew said of her team's home debut.  "We made some defensive changes.  Hopefully, it's something that we can stick with for the rest of the season.  We keep working at it and getting better, but the girls brought effort.  Everybody brought something to the table that played, and that is what was missing.  We had some people just not giving effort for whatever reason, and they gave effort tonight."

The senior duo of Marie McAbee and Kajuanna Rivers powered the TU offense to have their best half of shooting of the season after the team exited the locker room, shooting 57 percent from the field and 56 percent from beyond the arc in the second half.  McAbee was the leading scorer for the game, earning 14 of her 16 total points in the first 20 minutes to go with six total rebounds.  Rivers caught fire in the second half, shooting just under 50 percent from the field for the game, and finishing with totals of 15 points and six assists.

McAbee, who has had a tendency to catch fire in the second half this season, had a great offensive game from the opening tip to end up with half of Tuskegee's point total after the first 20 minutes.

"That's probably the best first half she's had thus far," Askew said.  "A lot of times, Marie likes to wait until the end of the game to show up and play.  But, they made her shoot the ball.  They left her wide open, so she had no choice but to shoot."

For the great second half by Rivers, Askew wanted to rest her starting point guard in order to preserve energy.  It was a strategy that paid great dividends, with unprecedented distribution of the basketball in the early stages of the season.

"She played, and I didn't really know that she was going to have the stamina that she had coming off of that little break to go in the second half," Askew said.  "But, she made it through.  I had sat her a lot more in the first half, because I think as the time has passed, she has fatigued in the second half.  So, she rested the first half and was able to finish strong this game."

The Tigerettes will get a day off before playing their second home game of the week against the Lady Rams of Mobile.  That program is playing well at this particular point in time, knocking off two schools in the NAIA's preseason Top 25 (Xavier [La.] and Southern Poly [Ga.] en route to a 4-1 record.

In her opinion, Askew believes that Tuskegee can compete with any other team on the schedule when they play like they did on Tuesday.

"We were worried about when we would get this victory, then it came with a complete game," Askew said.  "We really weren't expecting a 20-something point lead with the win.  But, it came because everybody did good things.  Now, they can see that things work when everybody can do their job."