Smothering defense and 21 points from Erin Walsh helped lead the Lee women's basketball team past rival Shorter, 64-48 on Saturday evening from Walker Arena.

Walsh connected on 8 of 15 shots and canned three triples. The sophomore from Knoxville is averaging 16 points per game this season to pace the Lady Flames offense.

"We did a much better job defensively, especially without fouling in the second half," said head coach Marty Rowe. "We forced them to take some tough shots and rebounded really well."

When asked about Walsh, Rowe praised the work ethic of his sophomore guard, "she's a really good player and she works hard and never takes plays off in practice or in the game. When your best player plays like that you can really build your team around that. We need Erin to continue to play that way and when she does were really, really good."

Lee held Shorter to just 19 first half points and limited the Lady Hawks to only 27.1 percent from the field in the game. The Lady Flames led from start to finish and now hold a 34-13 advantage over Shorter all-time.

"I thought the bench was huge for us today. Shelby (Brown) continues to play well and Jo (Jordan Neuharth) and Tori (Lentz) gave us good minutes and KB (Kayla Beavers) didn't hit a 3 but she was very engaged on defense for us," noted Rowe. "It was a huge team effort all the way around."

Brown continued her stellar play of late with a double-double performance of 11 points and 10 rebounds off the bench for Lee. Christina Johnson pulled down 12 boards as Lee out-rebounded the Lady Hawks by a 40-31 margin. The Lady Flames are 11^th in the NCAA D2 in rebounding margin per game ( 9.7).

The Lady Flames shot 52.3 percent from the field (23 of 44) and were 13 of 18 from the foul line. Lee hit a sizzling 59.1 percent of its shots in the second half.

Point guard Haris Price had eight points and dished off six assists while Carrie Cheeks added nine markers and Anna Woodford pitched in eight to cap a balanced scoring effort for Rowe's club.

Shorter's Kayla Tillie led the vistors with 12 points. Tamarr Williams added 10 points and Taylor Adams scored seven to go along with nine rebounds.

The victory keeps Lee atop the GSC standings at 9-2 (12-4 overall). The Lady Flames are joined by No. 25 Delta State and No. 18 Union in a three-way tie for first. Shorter falls to 11-4 and 8-3 on the year.

For the third time in four contests the Lady Flames will battle another team tied for first in the league as rival Union comes to town for a Thursday evening contest beginning at 6 p.m.