RAEFORD — The Richmond women’s basketball team used balanced scoring to earn its first Southeastern Conference victory of the season.

Leading scorer LaShey Brown scored a team-high 17 points, I’Teionna McLaughlin netted 16 points and Imani Purcell added 15 points off the bench as the Lady Raiders rolled to their third straight triumph with a 61-45 win over Hoke Friday night.

“I couldn’t ask for a better way to open up the conference,” interim Lady Raiders coach Nellie Harrington said. “To have three players score in double figures was real big. Imani, who used to start, stepped up and gave us a big lift off the bench.”

Richmond (10-1 overall, 1-0 SEC) led 14-12 at the end of the first quarter. The Lady Raiders extended their lead to eight points at 33-25 at halftime. Richmond led by 19 points going into the fourth, after outscoring the Lady Bucks 19-8 in the third to take a 52-33 advantage. The Lady Raiders went on to cruise to a 16-point triumph.

“We played good defense, limited them to one shot several times and did good job of rebounding the ball,” Harrington said. “We also did a good job of penetrating to the basket and getting layups.”

The Lady Raiders return to action against Purnell Swett in a SEC contest Tuesday at Raider Gym with tipoff slated for 6 p.m.

Hoke 48, Richmond men 45

Tedarrius Wiley’s open 3-pointer rimmed out at the buzzer as the Raider men fell to Hoke Friday night.

Wiley paced Richmond with 11 points, while Brian Love added 10 points. The loss snapped Richmond’s four-game winning streak, dropping the Raiders to 9-3 overall, 0-1 in the Southeastern Conference.

According to Raider coach David Laton, Richmond squandered its opportunity to pull out a win by failing to convert at the free-throw line late in the contest.

Laton said the Raiders missed two consecutive front ends of 1-and-1 attempts with the game tied at 45.

“You got to hit your foul shots late in a close game, and we failed to do that,” Laton said.

The Raiders will try to rebound when they return to action against conference foe Purnell Swett Tuesday at Raider Gym at 7:30 p.m.

“No team is going to go undefeated in the conference,” Laton said. “Hopefully, we will bounce back and even our record in the conference in our next game.”