RICHMOND, Va. – Virginia Commonwealth University forced a season-high tying 30 turnovers for the second-straight game and used balanced scoring to defeat Northeastern 78-54 at the Verizon Wireless Arena Sunday afternoon in the Colonial Athletic Association opener for both squads.

VCU ties a season-best three-game win streak and improves to 8-5 overall and 1-0 in CAA play, while Northeastern dropped its fifth-straight and falls to 5-7 and 0-1 in conference action.

"I think the most important thing for our team was to get the first conference win under our belt," said VCU Head Coach Beth Cunningham.  "You have to give Northeastern credit.  They're a feisty team and they kept coming at us.  With the way that they shoot the three and attack the basket and rebound, we never felt like we had a large enough lead.

"For the most part our seniors really came out and did a great job.  In addition to that, Jennifer Lane and Kita Waller really set the tempo for us early in the game on the defensive end of the floor."

Senior guard Kita Waller (Gainesville, Ga.) nearly missed her first career triple-double and led four VCU players in double figures, registering a team-high 20 points with nine rebounds and eight steals.  Sophomore forward Courtney Hurt (Loganville, Ga.) posted her second double-double in a row with 10 points and 12 rebounds, while senior guard La'Tavia Rorie (Charlotte, N.C.) (right) contributed 18 points and senior forward D'Andra Moss (Atlanta, Ga.) added 15 points.

Sophomore guard Jennifer Lane (Wichita, Kansas) also finished with eight points for the Rams, while adding a game-high six assists, five steals and hitting a perfect 6-of-6 at the free throw line.

Northeastern senior forward Kim Carr led the Huskies with a game-high 23 points and 11 rebounds.  Senior forward Kendra Walton added 12 points and sophomore guard Dani Iervolino chipped in nine points off the bench.

VCU scored nine-straight points to open the game before Northeastern reeled off the next eight to pull within a point with 14:47 remaining in the first half.  However, it was as close as the Huskies would get the remainder of the game as VCU quickly built a 21-10 advantage just five minutes later.

Northeastern pulled within seven on three occasions the remainder of the half, including 33-26 with 3:46 showing, but VCU, which converted 17 Northeastern turnovers into 28 first half points, scored the final 10 points of the period to take a comfortable 43-26 lead into the locker room.

The Huskies chipped away and pulled within 53-44 on a pair of Iervolino free throws with 10:16 remaining but VCU again answered and went back up by 15 three minutes later.  The Rams then recorded 17 of the final 23 points to secure the win.

VCU scored half of its points off a season-high tying 30 Northeastern turnovers and forced 30 miscues for the second-straight game.

"Our focus on the defensive end is to try and take teams away from what they really want to do," said Cunningham.  "The big thing for us is that we've been able to create some offense from our defense over the last couple of games.  That's something we want to continue to do as we move into the remainder of our conference schedule."

VCU continues conference play on Thursday, January 7 with a 7 p.m. matchup at UNC Wilmington.