By Jerry Briggs
Special for The JB Replay

The UTSA women kept alive their chances for an undefeated season at home Wednesday night with a 60-46 victory over the East Carolina Pirates in a physical American Athletic Conference encounter at the Convocation Center.

Jordyn Jenkins produced 23 points and six rebounds as first-place UTSA (21-3, 12-1 in the AAC) improved its home winning streak to 14 games, dating back to last year. The Roadrunners are 11-0 at home this season.

East Carolina (13-12, 5-8) came into San Antonio having won two in a row and three of four, including a road win at UAB. But UTSA was relentless with a defensive effort that held the visitors to 26 percent shooting from the field.

Pirates guard Khia Miller was ejected from the game early in the second half for an intentional foul on Roadrunners’ forward Maya Linton. Linton also was assessed a technical, her second, which disqualified her for the remainder of the game.

Addressing the media afterward, UTSA coach Karen Aston wasn’t happy that one of her players was ejected. She didn’t love the idea that her team turned it over 21 times, either, or that East Carolina won the rebounding battle (41-39).

But she will take a 14-point victory in which her team led for almost the entire 40 minutes and led by as many as 20 in the second half.

“Happy to get another win here in the Convo, for sure,” Aston said. “(The season is) winding down and (it’s) hard to believe we just have two more of these (home games) in here. I thought we played really well, for the most part.

“We’ll look back on it and nit-pick a little bit about some careless turnovers. Obviously, the rebounding was a big one that we’ve got to clean up before we play (Memphis, at home) on Saturday. But I thought we had a better aggressiveness about ourselves today. A better tempo for the way we played offensively.

“That’s really what I was hoping for tonight. So, we’ll clean up the rest of it.”

In what is shaping up as a possible dream season for the Roadrunners, they have won four straight overall and 14 of their last 15, with five to go in the regular season.

Sitting on 21 wins, they are tied with the 1983-84 Roadrunners for the third most in a season in school history, behind only the 2007-08 team with 23 and the ’08-09 team with 24.

Defeating ECU also allowed them to stay a game in the loss column ahead of the second-place South Florida Bulls (17-8, 10-2) and two games ahead of the third-place North Texas Mean Green (18-7, 10-3) in the AAC regular-season title race.

South Florida and North Texas both won at home Wednesday night to keep the pressure on the Roadrunners, with the Bulls downing the Rice Owls, 82-77 in three overtimes, and the Mean Green pounding the Memphis Tigers, 97-57.

In the UTSA postgame, Jenkins talked about what it was like to be on the floor, at home, and to be able to hold East Carolina to four points in a 17-4, second-quarter show of force.

“The home crowd obviously helps, really getting into it and chanting ‘D-Up,’ ” Jenkins said. “But it comes with communication on the court. When we’ve got solid communication, it’s fun, and it makes things easier.

“We have trouble with that a lot during practice. We need to be better at that so we can consecutively have good possessions.”

UTSA’s second quarter was a defensive clinic. The Roadrunners held the Pirates to one for 16 shooting from the field and forced five turnovers.

In addition, two UTSA forwards off the bench, Cheyenne Rowe and Taylor Ross, had a major impact. Both had five rebounds in the period alone and Ross, a freshman from Brennan, also blocked a shot.

Rowe (eight points, 10 rebounds for the game) and Ross (three and seven) both played 18 minutes total and allowed the Roadrunners to cruise to an easy victory, even with foul-plagued starters Idara Udo and Linton not being major factors in the game.

Asked about Rowe and Ross’ contributions, Aston said, “That’s what I’ve been looking for.”

Another narrative coming into the game centered on what happened between the Roadrunners and the Pirates the last time they played.

Last March 12 in Fort Worth, East Carolina rallied from a pair of 11-point deficits in the fourth quarter to beat UTSA, 55-54, in the AAC semifinals, ending the Roadrunners’ quest for the conference’s automatic bid to the NCAA tournament.

Love and Jenkins both chuckled at a question about whether there was any talk among players in the last few days about last year’s disappointment against the Pirates.

“No, we kind of wanted to leave that in the past,” Love said. “I don’t know. I think we just moved on and focused on being in the present and being where we are right now.”

Forward Amiyah Joyner led the Pirates with 18 points and eight rebounds. The 6-foot-2 forward hit six of 13 shots from the field. The rest of her teammates shot a combined 11 of 52.

Records

East Carolina 13-12, 5-8
UTSA 21-3, 12-1

Coming up

Memphis at UTSA, Saturday, Feb. 15, 2 p.m.
UTSA at Rice, Saturday, Feb. 22, 4 p.m.

First half

Dominating with physical play in the paint and effective position defense on the perimeter, the Roadrunners held the Pirates to four points in the second quarter. Consequently, they surged to a 29-17 lead at halftime.

UTSA shrugged off a sluggish start and outscored ECU 17-4 in the second. ECU got flustered at the end of the period after Love tied up Joyner.

Trying to hang on to the ball, Joyner was pulled down to the floor. Once there, she tossed the ball and hit UTSA forward Maya Linton in the midsection. Linton tossed it back, prompting officials to stop play and go to the replay monitors.

After it was sorted out, both Joyner and Linton were hit with technical fouls.

Notable

Early in the third quarter, emotions boiled over once again. It started with Miller bringing the ball over halfcourt on the dribble, with Linton meeting her to contest. Trying to clear space, Miller swung her arms while clutching the ball.

She appeared to land an elbow on Linton, who held her head with both hands momentarily. Afterward, she looked up and appeared to say something in frustration. Referees stopped the action again and went to the monitors to assess what happened.

Miller was hit with an intentional foul and an automatic ejection. Linton also got a technical. Combined with the one she had in the first half, she was sent to the dressing room.

Quotable

Aston said she didn’t see what caused the flaring of tempers between Joyner and Linton in the second quarter.

“I honestly didn’t see anything until the tail end,” Aston said. “They called a jump ball, and I’m trying to figure out whose possession it is. There’s only five seconds left. I’ll have to look at these situations on film and see if we can handle ourselves a little differently than what we did.

“I thought we re-grouped at halftime. We talked about it and then the little episode in the third quarter (between Miller and Linton) I thought really hurt us, to be honest with you, because it took away our aggression, because we didn’t quite know what to do with that, and we tried to monitor what was going on. I thought it took away from the flow of the game for us, definitely.

“So, we got to learn some lessons from that.”

AAC contenders

Basketball teams in the AAC play 18 games in the regular season. Here is a look at the top five in the AAC women’s title chase:

UTSA 12-1, 21-3
South Florida 10-2, 17-8
North Texas 10-3, 18-7
Tulane 8-4, 15-8
Temple 8-5, 14-10

Correction: An earlier version of this story misstated UTSA’s record in the AAC regular season. UTSA is 12-1 in conference.