HAMMOND – Northwestern State fell victim to a determined defense and relentless offensive attack on Saturday in a 90-56 loss to Southeastern to open Southland Conference play.

The Lady Demons (7-5, 0-1) saw the game begin to slip away after a problematic second quarter where the Lady Lions (5-6, 1-0) made nine of their first 11 shots from the field and held NSU off the scoreboard completely to close the half turning a close game into a one-sided affair.

"We came out of the gate prepared but just didn't come out fighting," head coach Anna Nimz said. "Normally when one person is in a slump, thus far somebody else has been able to knock some shots down, create and get some things going and that didn't happen.

"We didn't show a lot of poise or maturity and we fought ourselves a little bit and that's something we haven't seen so far. It was a good wake-up call. I'm glad this is game one and not game 14 and we'll have a lot of good teaching points from this."

The pressure defense by the Lady Lions started right from the jump, as did the fiery shooting effort. Back-to-back 3-pointers in the first four possessions gave the home team, playing their first game in nearly a month, an early 8-0 lead.

JaMiya Braxton drilled an open look from deep on the next trip for the Lady Demons and sparked a 12-3 run that erased the early deficit and put NSU ahead with three minutes left in the quarter. Jiselle Woodson weaved her way through traffic with a behind-the-back dribble to pull the Lady Demons within a point and Candice Parromore dropped in a jumper after a Jasmin Dixon block for the lead.

The Lady Lion scored the next six points in a row to go back on top before Woodson found Dixon underneath for an easy bucket with 26 seconds left to make it a three-point game. After the early offensive momentum by the Lions the spark that ignited the inferno came as the quarter buzzer sounded on a 3-pointer that made it a 20-14 game.

Those three points, plus the six prior to Dixon's late-quarter layup, were the first of an overall 34-8 SLU run that spanned the entire second quarter. The Lady Lions made nine of their first 11 shots in the frame before cooling off to finish 3-for-7. By the time to cool-down came it was a 39-18 game and the Lady Demons were in the midst of a more than six-and-a-half-minute scoreless drought to end a forgettable second quarter.

The Lady Lions extended their lead in the third quarter to its largest of the game on eight NSU turnovers in the first six-plus minutes leading to 12 easy points. The Lady Demons clamped down on the ball security to finish the quarter and put together a 12-point run of their own to finish the third all from the hands of Parramore and Monette Bolden.

The first six of the run came from the free-throw line, where the seventh ranked free throw shooter in the country Parramore netted four on four attempts. Bolden drilled a 3 with 35 seconds left in the quarter and Parramore beat the third-quarter buzzer with one of her own, each assisting on the other's shot.

She scored five points in short succession early in the fourth quarter for her second straight 20-point game and lead all scorers for the game.

The Lady Demons lost their first game this year when making more 3-point shots that their opponent due in large part to the 62-20 margin in paint scoring for the game. NSU continues its three-game conference road trip next Thursday at Nicholls.