Heading into Saturday, the American women’s basketball team had won four of its last five games. They were 7-3 and looking to head into Patriot League play with some momentum.

Instead, the Colonials clipped the Eagles’ wings and turned them completely upside down, coasting to a 77-64 victory.

With the team’s leading scorer Megan Nipe out with a lower-body injury, head coach Jonathan Tsipis needed at least one person to pick up the slack. He got three.

Graduate student Danni Jackson, junior Chakecia Miller and freshman Hannah Schaible combined for 56 points, causing problems for the Eagles defense all afternoon. The three would help the Colonials open up a 17-point halftime lead, going on a 21-10 run over the last seven minutes of the first half.

“The challenge we made to the team was that everyone just needed to step up and do a little bit more – rebound the ball more, make sure that we got it out in transition more,” Tsipis said.

The first step to completely rattling the Eagles was on offense. Coming into the game, American boasted the No. 1 defense in the Patriot League, limiting opponents to just 54.8 points per game. At halftime alone, GW had already scored 51 points.

Without her normal backcourt partner, Jackson still looked perfectly in sync. On the first play of the game, she drained a pull-up jumper from the elbow – a shot she would hit multiple times on the day. Jackson would end the game leading all scorers with a career-high 23 points, while adding three rebounds and four assists.

“I just really wanted to stay in attack mode,” Jackson said. “Coach had talked to me before the game and told me to attack and just keep shooting and I was feeding off my teammates and I just tried to envision that every shot was going in.”

Once again, Schaible proved herself as both a smooth and gritty player for the Colonials. On the stat sheet, her line read 15 points, four rebounds and three assists – a strong effort – but even more impressive were her hustle plays that gave GW the second chance opportunities they needed to extend the lead.

Starting in place of Nipe was junior guard Chakecia Miller. Not the same prolific shooter as Nipe, Miller brought a different style of play to the court, aggressively running the fast break and getting to the rim for easy buckets. She would finish with 18 points, going 6-6 at the free throw line.

“When I saw the lane open I wanted to attack the basket and I’ve been working on my shot, so when I saw the opportunity to take a pull up jumper, I did that as well, Miller said. “I think the whole thing was just being in that aggressive mentality.”

As per usual, though, Miller’s biggest impact was on the defensive end, where she led the Colonials charge to turn defense into offense. GW would force 15 Eagles turnovers on the day – four of those coming off steals by Miller – and lead American 22-14 in point off turnovers.

The AU offense looked fluid, using a lot of quick, unselfish passes to break the GW press and get some open looks. Unfortunately for the Eagles, none of those open looks could find the basket. AU shot an abysmal 36 percent from the field, and an even worse 23.8 percent from beyond the arc.

Specifically having trouble finding her shot was the Eagles leading scorer Alexis Dobbs. Despite reaching her season average of 15 points, Dobbs shot just 4-10 from the field, most in part to the constant pressure that the GW defense put on her.

“We mixed it up – I think Danni started on her and then we put Kecia on her, but we just wanted to keep a fresh person on her and make her work bringing the ball up the court and chase her,” said Tsipis, who later added, “I think we did a really good job of making her try and shoot as many contested shots as possible.”

Dobbs would score just two second-half points and coming off a game in which she had ten assists and one turnover, she would dish out just four assists, while turning the ball over a game-high six times.

The easy win marks the fourth-straight victory for the Colonials and serves as a big piece of momentum as they embark on three games over the next eight days.

Nipe will continue to be day-to-day, and according to Tsipis, will likely not play on in the team’s next matchup against Bluefield State on Dec. 31.