No. 7 Louisville women beat Austin Peay 108-53

Published Dec. 15, 2013 3:37 a.m. ET

foxsports

Louisville overpowered Austin Peay - and made coach Jeff Walz happy, too.

The seventh-ranked Cardinals had 27 assists and only eight turnovers in their 108-53 victory over Austin Peay on Saturday night.

''We did a much better job of taking care of the basketball,'' Walz said. ''We've been working really hard in practice on making the extra pass, playing without the ball, playing on the weak side.

''We've been trying to preach to them all year the fact that we do shoot the ball well, but if you turn it over, you're not giving yourself a chance.''

Shoni Schimmel scored 24 points, Cortnee Walton had 13, and Sara Hammond 12 points to help Louisville (10-1) win its third straight game. Ranked sixth nationally in field goal shooting at 49 percent, the Cardinals shot 52 percent against the Lady Govs.

Austin Peay missed 11 of its first 15 attempts from the field and shot 30 percent overall.

Kristen Stainback led Austin Peay (3-6) with 14 points and Jennifer Nwokocha had eight.

Stainback scored eight of the first 10 points for Austin Peay, which held its last lead at 7-6. Louisville responded with a 10-0 run and led 56-34 at halftime.

Schimmel was 9 of 14 from the field for thee deep Cardinals.

''One thing Coach talks about is how our whole team there's no drop off,'' Schimmel said. ''For us to have that it's a great thing and for us to have 1 through 13 solid it's going to help us.''

Louisville converted Austin Peay's 24 turnovers into 28 points.

''They look to turn you over and out of those they create offense from that,'' Austin Peay coach Carrie Daniels said. ''That's what we saw in the first half, was just the transition they got. That hurt us.''

It was the third straight loss for Austin Peay.