Correspondent photo / Robert Hayes. YSU sophomore guard Hayden Barrier drives and tosses up a jumper in the paint during the second half of Wednesday's contest against Salem. Barrier finished with a career-high 18 points.

YOUNGSTOWN — Scoring is in Youngstown State sophomore guard Hayden Barrier’s blood, literally.

Her mother, Beth, scored 1,211 points in a four-year college career at Alabama, while also earning a spot in the Kentucky high school basketball record books with 2,685 points.

More than 20 years later, Barrier followed in her mother’s footsteps by scoring more than 2,400 career points during her high school career at Montgomery County in Kentucky.

After battling some injuries and learning the ropes of the college game as a freshman last year, Barrier has seen her role greatly increase with the Penguins this season. On Wednesday, she found her scoring touch once again, finishing with career highs in points (18), steals (5) and made 3-pointers (four) as YSU cruised past overmatched Division II foe Salem (W.Va.) 97-20 to close out the 2025 calendar.

“I’ve been really happy with her. I think she’s a huge spark for us — exactly what we need coming off the bench,” head coach Melissa Jackson said. “Obviously she can shoot the ball, but she can do so much more. Very much a three-level scorer, got to see a little bit of that tonight.

“But flies around and plays with so much passion on the court. Really fits our program extremely well. So we’re happy to see that ball go in the net for her. Love her defense, love her intensity and her anticipation with those steals, and you got to see that today.”

Barrier has always had that scoring ability, but confidence in her shot has been key since she’s been working through a bit of a slump in recent weeks after a strong start to her sophomore campaign in November, when she scored in double figures twice.

“The past couple games, I haven’t been hitting a ton, so coming out and hitting a couple shots definitely felt good,” Barrier said. “Coach Jackson talked with me this morning, and she just made sure that I knew she had a lot of confidence in me and that she believed in me, and that’s all I needed to hear.”

Right from the opening tip, Barrier wasn’t shy about pulling the trigger once she got a look.

She hit three 3-pointers in the first half and scored nine of her 18 points in the fourth quarter, finishing 7-for-13 overall and 4-of-9 from deep.

“It’s special to me,” Barrier said of her career-high mark. “I think in high school, you kind of lose that spark if you’re scoring 15-20 points a game. Coming here and scoring that much, it means a lot to me. I think I’ll remember it for a long time, especially because it was on our home floor.”

Barrier’s increase in playing time this year has corresponded directly to her growth on the defensive side of the ball. Her five steals against the Tigers were the most in a game by a Penguin this season.

“Big thanks to Coach (Kayla DeCriscio), she’s the one that helped me out with it,” Barrier said. “But I think defense translating to offense is a big thing for me, and it showed tonight, I think. … I take a lot of pride in what (the coaches) want me to do. I try to play as hard as I can because I know she expects that of me and everybody else, so it’s been fun.”

Against the Tigers, YSU jumped out to a 16-0 lead and never looked back. Salem’s 20 total points were the fewest points allowed in a game in program history. It broke the previous record of 25 points, set against Malone in 1990.

Taja Brown led the Tigers with 11 points, as they shot 11.9% overall and just 5% from three.

“Our defense is really strong. We take very much pride in our defense, especially because we had to wait a little to play this game,” sophomore guard Erica King said. “We were like, they are not going to score on us. That’s what we wanted. But obviously every team scores, we were just glad that we were able to keep our defense disciplined.”

All 11 players that dressed played at least 12 minutes and recorded at least one field goal. King and Paulina Hernandez joined Barrier in double figures with 16 and 15 points, respectively.

“I think it makes all of our hearts happy — coaching staff, players, managers, everybody — we love seeing people do good,” Barrier said. “We love seeing people do what we know they can do and performing how we know they can perform.”

BURCH STEPS AWAY

After missing Monday’s road trip to Cleveland State and Wednesday’s home contest against Salem due to “personal reasons,” redshirt-senior forward Faith Burch has decided to “step away” from the program, Jackson confirmed after the game.

Burch didn’t make the trip to Cleveland, but was in the stands to watch the Penguins face the Tigers.

“(It was) her decision. She’s got unbelievable relationships with us and this team, so not surprised to see her in the stands cheering those guys on,” Jackson said. “But her decision to step away.”

A Warren native and Warren G. Harding alum, Burch transferred to YSU prior to the start of the 2024-25 season from Cleveland State, where she played three seasons.

In her first season with the Penguins last year, she averaged career highs of 6.8 points and 5.8 rebounds in 21.2 minutes per game. However, this year, with the team fully healthy and the continued growth of the rest of the post players, her role had diminished slightly, as her averages dipped to 3.4 points and 4.7 rebounds in 12.6 minutes per game.

Next up, YSU continues its four-game homestand on Monday at 6:30 p.m. against Oakland, before hosting Northern Kentucky at 7:17 p.m. on Jan. 8 and Purdue Fort Wayne at 2 p.m. on Jan. 10.