MONTGOMERY, Ala.-The Lady Hornets had a rough start against the Grambling Lady Tigers, but they managed to turn it around for a 69-61 win at home in the Dunn-Oliver Acadome.

ASU was coming off a tough home loss against Southern on Monday, their first one of the season, and it looked as though it carried over to Wednesday. 

“I think some of them were still thinking about what happened last game,” assistant coach Clayton Harris said when asked about their slow start. “We did something we do not customarily do; we were not playing defense… we gave up 25 points in the first, so we had to put our foot back on our style, which is playing defense.”

The Lady Hornets were down 25-15 after the first, but they were able to gain some ground in the second and went into halftime down 38-32. After halftime, it was all ASU. After being even in the scoring margin (18-17 ASU), The Lady Hornets went on a 19-6 run in the fourth to seal the victory.

Shmya Ward led all scorers with a 19-point, 10-rebound double-double, with Tyesha Rudolph and Ayana Emmanuel contributing 18 and 13 points, respectively.

Ward’s 19 points did not come easy. She was battling with Grambling’s Jasmine Forte, who had a game-high 9 blocks. 

“We had to move Shmya around,” Harris said, “Forte is what, 6-foot-3? And Shyma five-foot-11. We had to figure how to move Shmya around to use her quickness against that size, so I thought that we did a good job of moving Shmya around, and that’s why she was able to take [Forte] off the dribble and beat her to the basket.”

With the win, the Lady Hornets are now 5-1 overall and in the SWAC, with the next two games in Texas as they’ll face Texas Southern on Saturday and Prairie View A&M on Monday.