SENATOBIA – Despite a quality effort from freshman Tamarah Sykes, Northwest was unable to overcome a red hot Shaniyah Buford and Itawamba, as the Lady Indians rolled to an 83-59 victory at Howard Coliseum on Monday night.

Northwest dropped to 4-6 and 0-1 in the MACJC North Division with the loss. Itawamba improved to 5-2 and 1-0 in division competition.

Buford caught fire for the Lady Indians early in the contest, shooting 4-of-5 from beyond the arc for 14 of ICC's 27 first quarter points.

Northwest tried to keep pace with Itawamba over the remainder of the first half with eight points and four rebounds from Ericka Richardson, but it wasn't enough to slow the Lady Indians, who took a 53-29 lead into halftime.

After being held scoreless for the entire first half, Sykes did enough damage to dent the ICC lead by scoring nine of her 13 points in the third quarter and pulling down six of her 10 rebounds in the final 10 minutes.

Even though the Lady Rangers managed to outscore ICC 31-29 over the final 20 minutes of the contest, Itawamba still kept its foot on the pedal for most of the second half to pick up the division-opening victory.

Two major factors in the Lady Rangers' loss were points off turnovers and fast break points, where ICC outscored Northwest 35-9 and 28-2, respectively.

Aside from Sykes' performance, Richardson and Lindsay Hall totaled 10 points apiece with Hall shooting 2-for-5 from 3-point range.

Buford led ICC with 24 points and four steals, while Tabreea Gandy (11), Zaria Jenkins (11) and Kealy Wilson (10) also finished in double figures.

Following an extended holiday break, Northwest will resume action against Blue Mountain JV on Thursday, Jan. 8. Tipoff from Howard Coliseum is scheduled for 5 p.m. with live video and live stats through nwccrangers.com.