The ISU women’s basketball team rebounded in its two-game tilt with Big Ten teams by defeating Northwestern Dec. 7 after falling to Michigan Dec. 5.

The Redbirds (5-3) won by a margin of 64-46 at Redbird Arena.

“It’s great for our players to use this win to build their confidence,” ISU head coach Stephanie Glance said. “We took down a BCS team and that is always great for the Missouri Valley Conference and for Illinois State.”

Senior guard Jamie Russell registered 24 points and 10 rebounds, good for her third double-double effort of the campaign. Sixteen of Russell’s 24 points came in the second half.

“Jamie just really started firing on all cylinders in the second half,” Glance said. “She had a big double-double and is a person who certainly went to the boards with seven offensive rebounds as a guard.”

Sophomore guard Katy Winge earned a career-high 12 points on four three-pointers, all in the first half.

“Winge came out firing to bury four threes in the first half,” Glance said. “I’m sure they’re thinking, ‘OK, great. Now they have another weapon on the floor that we have to figure out how to guard.’ It’s a credit to her mentality and she has come out in practice shooting like that.”

Just two nights after being outrebounded 42 to 24 by Michigan, the Redbirds posted a 54 to 39 rebounding advantage against NU.

“Our rebounding margin was very impressive against that kind of size,” Glance said. “You could just look on the floor and it looked like Northwestern had at least five inches on every one of our players.”

ISU attained 35 percent shooting on the evening, while holding Northwestern to 28 percent.

The Redbirds raced out to an 8-2 lead just over three minutes into the game thanks to a Russell two-point bucket and a three-pointer each by Winge and freshman guard Alexis Foley.

After more than two minutes of scoreless basketball from both teams, the Wildcats converted on a layup to get within four at 8-4, but a Winge three extended ISU’s lead to 11-4 with 14:52 left in the opening half.

The Wildcats went on a 4-0 run to cut their deficit to three points at 11-8 before ISU scored the next five points to take a 16-8 lead. The surge included another Winge three-pointer and two points from sophomore forward Janae Smith.

Winge’s final three-point basket of the ballgame came with 9:50 remaining in the first half to give the Redbirds a 19-12 advantage. However, NU cut its deficit to five points at 30-25 going into the locker room for the halftime break.

ISU opened the second half by outscoring the Wildcats 6-2, including four points from Russell and sophomore forward Maddie Oliver’s two points to grab a 36-27 advantage with 17:46 left in the contest. The Redbirds took their first double-digit lead of the game at 47-37 with 10:22 remaining in the second half.

But NU went on a 6-2 run to get within six points, 49-43 with 7:47 left. ISU responded by scoring the next 10 points of the contest to take a 16-point lead, 59-43. The run was highlighted by four points apiece from Russell and Oliver and two points by Smith.

The Wildcats were held scoreless for more than five minutes before converting on a three-point play with 1:36 remaining in the game to make the score 59-46 in favor of the Redbirds.

ISU finished the contest on a 5-0 run with two points from Russell and a three-pointer by senior guard Candace Sykes to conclude the evening’s scoring to give the Redbirds a 64-46 victory.

ISU has finals week off from competition before the Redbirds return to the court at 1 p.m. on Dec. 16 to take on Ball State at Redbird Arena.