Kirkwood Womens Basketball

Ajak hurt as No. 1 Eagles reach 24-0

The top-ranked Kirkwood Eagles raised their record to 24-0 Saturday  with a 93-71 victory over Southwestern, but there was no big  celebration or high-fives after the game.

The Eagles were too worried about freshman Awal Ajak to relish the  latest triumph in their perfect season.

Ajak, a talented 6-foot freshman from Des Moines, hurt her left knee  in the third quarter and left the gym on crutches. The extent of the  injury will be determined in the next few days, but Coach Kim Muhl  thinks it could be significant.

"I'm not optimistic," he said. "It's not good, I don't think. We'll see."

Ajak got hurt when she hustled back on defense following an errant  pass by the Eagles. She crumpled under the basket and spent several  minutes on the floor while being examined by the Kirkwood trainer  before being helped to the locker room.

"It starts with a bad pass," said Muhl. "You throw it away, you've got  to run it down and bad stuff happens."

Ajak has been a key reserve for Kirkwood, averaging 8.1 points and 3.7  rebounds in 16.3 minutes per game. The Eagles have a deep squad, but  her absence would be significant.

Southwestern (12-10, 3-5) gave Kirkwood a good game in the first half.  The visitors drained nine 3-pointers in the opening 20 minutes and  trailed by only four points at intermission, 46-42.

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No. 1 Kirkwood women now 23-0

The top-ranked Kirkwood women's basketball team has reached the  midpoint of the conference race with a perfect record.

If the Eagles sweep the landscape again in the second half of the  ICCAC campaign, they'll finish the regular season at 30-0 overall and 14-0 in the conference.

Kirkwood smashed Iowa Lakes, 92-43, Saturday afternoon with another dominating performance at Johnson Hall.

Deleyah Harris led the Eagles (23-0, 7-0) with 19 points and six  rebounds. Simone Goods collected a double-double with 15 points and 11  rebounds.

Shaneequah Watkins pitched in with 10 points, five rebounds, four assists and two steals. Christmas Puok tallied 10 points in 10 minutes off the bench.

Kirkwood led 50-19 at halftime.

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No. 1 Kirkwood women escape NIACC

MASON CITY - The Kirkwood women's basketball team received its biggest scare of the season Wednesday night, but the top-ranked Eagles escaped Mason City with a 71-65 victory over NIACC.

Kirkwood raised its records to 22-0 overall and 6-0 in the conference, but it was the first time all season that the Eagles did not win by double figures.

Deleyah Harris led Kirkwood with 14 points. Simone Goods finished with a double-double with 13 points and 11 rebounds.

Tay Wilson contributed 11 points, seven rebounds and four assists for the Eagles. Awal Ajak grabbed nine rebounds and Olivia Usher had seven rebounds.

Khalilah Holloway scored 17 points for NIACC (11-10, 3-3).

KIRKWOOD (71): Harris 4 4-5 14, T. Wilson 2 5-5 11, Puok 2 0-0 4,  Axcell 3 1-2 8, Ajak 2 2-4 6, Watkins 2 2-4 6, Voss 2 0-0 4, Cotton 1 0-0 2, Goods 5 3-4 13, Usher 1 1-2 3, Achenbach 0 0-0 0. Totals 24 18-26 71.

NIACC (65): Laabs 3 0-0 9, Longs 1 0-0 3, Cuffe 3 2-3 8, Stewart 0 0-0 0, Holloway 7 1-1 17, Galvin 1 0-0 3, Larson 3 2-2 9, Happel 1 0-0 3, Stanciel 2 0-0 4, Willert 3 0-0 8, Seely 0 0-0 0, Davidson 0 1-3 1. Totals 24 6-9 65.

Halftime -  NIACC 36, Kirkwood 33. 3-point goals - Kirkwood 5 (Harris 2, Wilson 2, Axcell 1). NIACC 11 (Laabs 3, Longs 1, Holloway 2, Galvin 1, Larson 1, Happel 1, Willert 2).

'Shaq' helps No. 1 Eagles go 21-0

Kirkwood sophomore Shaneequah Watkins has a beautiful first name, but  she's reluctantly grown to accept a lot of people calling her Shaq.

She's a lanky basketball player at 5-foot-8, but there's absolutely no resemblance in any way, shape or form to former NBA star Shaquille  O'Neal, the original Shaq at 7-foot-1 and 300 pounds.

It's a good basketball nickname, but not something Watkins has always embraced.

"At first I was a little bit disgusted, because I'm not this big guy,  I'm not a post player and I make my free throws, for the most part,"  she said Saturday. "After the years it kind of stuck."

Watkins is one of the most versatile players on the top-ranked  Kirkwood women's basketball team, which raised its record to a perfect  21-0 Saturday afternoon with an 86-29 cakewalk past Iowa Central in a  conference game at Johnson Hall.

Watkins finished with 12 points, four rebounds, three assists and one  steal in a typically well-rounded game and she's been stuffing the  stat sheet all season for the Eagles.

By now, she's grown accustomed to Kirkwood Coach Kim Muhl and a lot of  other people calling her Shaq.

"I got Shaq from my high school coach when I was coming from eighth  grade to freshman year and I would play jayvee or varsity in the  summer," she explained. "He couldn't pronounce my name and he said  Shaquilla or something and so it became Shaq. And that's how I ended  up with that."

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