When Lincoln women's basketball coach Drea Mize made a line change midway through the first quarter, she told those five players checking into the game she didn't want them to allow another point to be scored.
They very nearly lived up to that extremely lofty expectation.
The Blue Tigers ended the first quarter on a 19-0 run, then used a 17-0 run to dominate their way to a 97-20 win Tuesday night against the Blackburn Beavers at Jason Gym.
"The group that came in could hear my frustration, and they knew I meant business," Mize said.
Lincoln was leading 12-4 in the first quarter when Mize put in a new group of five players. They responded by scoring 14 unanswered points before the Blue Tigers made their next substitution late in the opening quarter.
Lincoln shot just 6-of-24 from 3-point range, but the Blue Tigers were 4-of-8 in the opening quarter to quickly stretch their lead to double digits. Niyah Jackson made a pair of 3s coming off the bench, while Kylie Bernskoetter and AJ Bradley each added an early 3.
"I liked it to start the game," Mize said of the 3-point shooting. "I thought it definitely crippled us toward the end."
Blackburn, a Division III program, trailed 27-4 after the opening quarter and 54-8 at halftime.
"We made the hustle plays," Mize said. "You could tell they were lethargic, they were missing shots, and we did a great job of making hustle plays, getting offensive rebounds, getting putbacks and getting to the free-throw line."
In Saturday's win against Arkansas-Monticello, Lincoln was able to work the ball inside with success. That wasn't necessary Tuesday night.
The Blue Tiger defense forced 36 turnovers - 23 in the first half - and scored 57 points off those turnovers, nearly triple that of Blackburn's final point total.
"The whole idea coming into this season was that defense would create offense," Mize said. "A couple times last year, when we got stagnant offensively, we didn't have an answer for it. This year, this allows us a little bit of confidence going into our offense."
Blackburn's DaArie Griffen snapped Lincoln's 25-0 run with a putback at the 7:56 mark of the second quarter, making the score 33-6. Then the Blue Tigers went on another run to lead 50-6 less than five minutes later.
By halftime, Lincoln had 12 players in the scoring column.
"I really liked being able to rotate players in, especially our final eight players," Mize said. "We changed defenses periodically, and we did a good job of communicating that and getting them where they needed to be."
Lincoln finished with 18 points in the third quarter to push the lead to 72-14. Of those nine baskets, four came off steals where players went coast-to-coast for the easy layup.
"Any time you come in and you know that you're going to get what you want offensively, it's really big to focus defensively," Mize said.
Lincoln held Blackburn to just one field goal in the fourth quarter, finishing the game on a 13-2 run in the final six minutes.
The 77-point win was Lincoln's largest margin of victory since beating Harris-Stowe State 110-26 during the 1996-97 season.
Kelsey Mitchell and Hya Haywood each scored 16 points to lead the Blue Tigers.
"Any time you can go 8-of-12 from the floor, that's great," Mize said of Haywood. "The better thing is when your deadly 3-point shooter (Mitchell) goes 1-of-6, but she's 5-of-8 from the rest of the floor and 3-of-4 from the free-throw line."
Bernskoetter and Imani Jones each scored nine points for the Blue Tigers, while Niyah Jackson and Ayreona Carter each added eight.
Bradley came off the bench to finish with team-highs of 10 rebounds and eight steals in addition to her six points.
"What she brings to the team is so much more than points," Mize said. "I love the steals, love the rebounds, especially from a 5-foot-4 point guard."
Blackburn (0-5), playing its fifth game in eight days, shot 7-of-38 from the floor and missed all 17 3-point attempts. Danielle Vogel, Mariah Hopson, Taliyah Davis and Rhylee Freeman each had four points for the Beavers, who were averaging 59.5 points entering Tuesday's game.
"We have to continue making adjustments," Mize said. "We did a good job from Friday to Saturday adjusting. Today, I thought we came out flat in the first quarter and did a better job of adjusting in the second quarter."
Lincoln (2-1) continues non-conference play at 5:30 p.m. Thursday at Illinois-Springfield. The Blue Tigers have already matched last season's win total - which was a conference-only schedule due to COVID-19 - with three non-conference games to play.
"It's big for student-athletes, but it's also big for coaching," Mize said of playing non-conference games. "I remember looking at my lineup last year, and who I started at the beginning of the year drastically changed 11 games in."