TALLAHASSEE, Florida — The University of Maryland Eastern Shore used a smothering defense and to punish Florida A&M University in the first half — soaring to a 38-13 lead at the break Saturday (Jan. 19) at the Lawson Center.

When it was all said and done the Hawks (8-10, 4-1 MEAC) had run away with a 68-36 victory.

"I thought we came in and took care of business attacking a young team," head coach Fred Batchelor said. "I thought we took advantage of the fact that they are young and green and we are on somewhat of a mission to play better basketball. I think that might have been the difference in the game."

Batchelor was particularly proud of the team's defensive effort as they held the Rattlers (2-14, 0-4 MEAC) to just 27 percent from the field and forced 23 turnovers.

"To give up 13 points in the first half was really good," Batchelor said. "I felt like we were connected. Our communication was really solid. We did some differ things with the  press and I thought that bothered them and forced turnovers. We weren't playing great on the offensive end, but we weren't playing poorly either. I thought the defense really led to us having the type of lead that we had and the energy and enthusiasm on defense was huge."

With the Hawks in early foul trouble, Batchelor turned to senior Dominique Walker (Bel Air, Maryland) who had amassed a double-double by the end of the third quarter.

"I thought Dom was huge today," Batchelor said. "And she did it in 21 minutes."

She finished with a game-high 11 points, 12 rebounds, two blocks and two steals in 21 minutes. Seven of her 12 boards were on the offensive end.

"I didn't even know," Walker said. "I just like to get open and my teammates see me. Usually it's the bigs and CiCi who spot me, so if it wasn't for my teammates I wouldn't getting anything except the rebounds. With the rebounds I guess it was just motor."

Others had to step in as well with Bairesha Gill-Miles (Lexington, Kentucky) and Ksenia Popovich (Moscow, Russia) combining for just 28 minutes due to foul trouble.

"I wanted to get Rose (Smith) some minutes and Rose needs to play," Batchelor said. "She's the biggest kid we have. I would have like to have gotten Chioma (Nkpuechina) some more minutes tonight, but I tried to really focus on Taylor (Clayborne) and Rose because Taylor particularly has  really shown that she can help us. I told my assistant coaches that we don't look too good — as good as she has been playing — if she isn't playing more. We want to take advantage of her development particularly when kids get into foul trouble."

Senior point guard Ciani Byrom (Winston-Salem, North Carolina) finished with 10 points, moving past Peggy Edwards (1989-93, 1,003) into eighth place on the all-time scoring list with 1,010. Kristi Sheldon (1995-99) is next in seventh place with 1,028.

Seniors Ra'Jean Martin (Jacksonville, Florida) and Keyera Eaton (Winston-Salem, North Carolina) added 10 points and four rebounds apiece.

The Hawks actually led 64-20 with just over seven minutes left in the game, when Batchelor emptied his bench.

By the end of the contest head coach Fred Batchelor had managed to get 88 minutes from his bench, which put up 28 points and grabbed 27 rebounds.

"I think it really helps on a swing like this when CiCi is not forced to play 36 minutes and KeKe and Ra'Jean are getting rest," Batchelor said. "They are getting to go out and play some good hard double digit minutes, get good work in and get rest because I'm anticipating that they are going to play a lot more minutes down in Daytona Beach."

The Hawks next travel to Bethune-Cookman for a Monday (Jan. 21) contest at 2 p.m.