February 21, 2007
San Antonio – Ashton Benford was named Heartland Conference Women’s Basketball Player of the Week for her play last week against Montana State University-Billings and Texas A&M International University, it was announced by the league office on Wednesday.
Benford (So., Waxahachie) helped the Rattlers to Heartland Conference wins against the Yellowjackets and Dustdevils. Against the MSUB she had a season-best 15 rebounds and eight points on 4-of-7 shooting from the field. She followed up with 15 points and five rebounds against the Dustdevils on 6-of-9 shooting from the field and 3-of-4 from the free throw line. For the week she averaged 11.5 points and 10.0 rebounds per game, hitting on 62.5 percent of her shots from the field. For the season she is averaging 10.1 points and 8.4 rebounds per game, while hitting on 51.1 percent from the field.
The honor marked the second time this season and fourth time overall that a Rattler has earned Heartland Player of the Week honors in 2006-07. Juanita Merchant (Jr., Angleton) earned the honor for the week of Dec. 11-17, Charlena Rodez (Sr., Cedar Park) earned it for the week of Dec. 25-31 and Benford previously earned the honor for the week of Feb. 5-11.
Benford and the Rattlers will return to action on Thursday when they travel to Goodwell, Okla., to take on Oklahoma Panhandle State University at 6 p.m. in the first game of a men’s/women’s doubleheader. The Rattlers will wrap up regular season play on Saturday when the travel to Odessa to play the University of Texas of the Permian Basin.