El Paso – UTEP’s inside game was too strong for the Sam Houston State women as the Miners kept their record at home in the Don Haskins Arena perfect Friday night with an 85-66 victory over the Bearkats.

Despite 25 points and seven rebounds by senior Bearkat forward Britni Martin, UTEP ran its record to 11-1 with their eighth home court victory of the season. The Miners out-rebounded Sam Houston 51-38 and out-scored the Kats in the paint 38-24.

Sequeena Thomas totaled 11 points but, for the first time this season, was held to single digit rebounds, pulling down just six boards. Thomas had gone seven consecutive contests with both double figure points and rebounds coming into Friday’s contest.

Anete Steinberga, a 6-1 forward, scored 23 points and grabbed seven rebounds for UTEP. The Miners’ Chrishauna Parker added 15 points and led both teams with 14 boards.

Sam Houston, now 3-8 for the year, started strong. Martin hit a three and Angela Beadle canned two free throws to put the Kats up 5-0 in the opening minutes.

At the 12:40 mark in the first half, SHSU and UTEP with tied 13-13 after another trey by Martin. But the Kats went cold, going four minutes without a basket as the Miners went on a 10-0 run. UTEP went into the locker room at intermission with a 44-25 lead.

Sam Houston and the Miners both scored 41 points in the second half but UTEP’s 42 percent shooting helped them walk away with the win.

Martin was 9-of-10 at the free throw line and 4-of-8 from three point range. The rest of the SHSU team hit only 2-of-12 from beyond the arc.

Jazmine Wiley added nine points and Angela Barnes scored eight.

Sam Houston State will complete its current six-game road swing Wednesday night at Houston Baptist before opening Southland Conference play Friday at 1 p.m. versus Texas A&M-Corpus Christi at Bernard G. Johnson Coliseum.