CONWAY — Houston Baptist kept the outcome in question until the final minutes but had no answer for Central Arkansas senior Kierra Jordan, who poured in a season-high 27 points to lead the Sugar Bears to a 64-56 victory in the Farris Center on Wednesday.

Leading by just two late in the first half, the Sugar Bears (16-7, 9-3 Southland) turned to Jordan – who went on a personal 7-0 run in a 46-second span to give Central Arkansas a 9-point halftime advantage. The teams would remain close throughout the second half – with the Sugar Bear lead never reaching double digits – and HBU (6-15, 2-9) was able to hang around and find itself trailing by just three with just over two minutes remaining.

Then Jordan took control once again, scoring the game's next points to push the Sugar Bear lead back out to 9 with under a minute to play, and four free throws from Taylor Baudoin and Maddie Goodner were enough to keep the Huskies at bay and send the Sugar Bears to their fifth straight win over HBU in Conway.

After shooting just 39 percent in their previous five games, the Sugar Bears connected on 49.1 percent of their field goal attempts on Wednesday – their highest mark of the conference season – with Jordan (72.2 percent) accounting for half of the team's baskets as they finished 26 of 53.

Antonija Bozic continued her hot streak from beyond the arc, knocking down a pair of 3-pointers in four attempts to improve to 12 of 26 (46.2 percent) over the last three games. The Southland leader in 3-point percentage, Bozic has made 51.4 percent over the last seven games.

Baudoin finished with 15 points, her 20th time this season in double figures, and moved closer to the 1,000-point mark for her career – ending the night sitting at 992.

HBU got 17 points and 6 rebounds from Sydney Carr, while Amanda Johnson added 15. Veronica Kirienko grabbed a game-high 11 rebounds in 19 minutes for the Huskies.

Next up for the Sugar Bears is a trip to McNeese next Wednesday before coming back home for two against Nicholls and Stephen F. Austin on Feb. 17 and 21.

NOTES
• The win improves the Sugar Bears to 21-4 in February games since 2015, with a 13-2 mark at home
• The Sugar Bears improve to 37-4 (.902) overall in the Farris Center since 2015
• With the victory, the Sugar Bears move to 8-2 all-time against HBU, having won the last 4 overall in the series and all 5 meetings in Conway
• In three games against HBU, ordan has averaged 21.3 points and 7.7 rebounds
• With the win and Abilene Christian's 81-60 loss at Nicholls, the Sugar Bears move into sole possession of 3rd place in the league standings behind Lamar (11-1) and SFA (10-1) entering the final third of the conference slate