Correspondent photo / Robert Hayes. YSU sophomore Hayden Barrier celebrates after hitting her second fourth quarter 3-pointer on Wednesday night against Wright State in the Horizon League tournament at Zidian Family Arena. Barrier scored eight critical points off the bench in the fourth quarter for the Penguins.

YOUNGSTOWN — On an off shooting night for Youngstown State’s leading scorer Casey Santoro, sophomore guard Erica King stepped up for the Penguins.

While Santoro was limited by Wright State’s tight defensive pressure all over the court on Wednesday, King led YSU with 19 points in a 76-60 victory over the Raiders, as the Penguins punched their ticket to the Horizon League semifinals for the first time since 2019.

“I loved Erica’s aggressiveness. She’s been playing well for us all year. She’s shooting the ball really well, and I thought she looked confident out there,” YSU head coach Melissa Jackson said. “This is a tough team to guard because of their ability to shoot the three and because of Breezie (Williams’) ability in the ball screen. I didn’t think we were super aggressive as much as I wanted to be in that first half. We talked about it at halftime, and we were absolutely the aggressors coming out at halftime and really set the tone.”

By advancing to the semifinals, this is also the YSU women’s basketball program’s first trip to Indianapolis since the Horizon League moved the tournament there in 2020.

Before the start of the season, the Penguins set goals to finish near the top of the league standings and also get to Indianapolis. YSU has now achieved both of those goals in Jackson’s second season leading the program after the team went 12-19 and bowed out to Wright State in the first round of the tournament last year.

The second-seeded Penguins will face No. 3 seed Cleveland State in the semifinals on Monday at 2:30 p.m. at Corteva Coliseum in Indianapolis. The Vikings escaped a scare against Oakland in overtime on Wednesday to advance.

“We went into the locker room and we talked about how all the hard work that we started on this journey back in June was to get to this moment,” Jackson said. “This team has continued to get better and better because that’s always been our No. 1 goal. But obviously in the back of our minds, one of our goals was to get to Indy. For us to accomplish this, it’s a big accomplishment for our program.

“This group isn’t satisfied. They want more. We know we’re going to have a great opponent because this league is so tough. But we will enjoy this. We will rest and be off tomorrow. Our assistants and me will be busy digging up a good gameplan for whoever we play next.”

Despite starting the game 0-for-5 from the floor, Santoro still finished with 12 points and six assists, which included going 10-for-10 from the free-throw line in the second half.

King and Santoro were two of YSU’s four double-figure scorers, as Sophia Gregory finished with 13 points and six assists despite picking up four fouls and Sarah Baker had 10 points.

“That’s a lot of hard work there, being hounded the entire game like she was — full court, double teams — so for her to have six assists with only one turnover speaks to her experience and just her calmness out there,” Jackson said. “But what’s even more impressive is that 10-for-10 from the free-throw line when you know she’s fatigued and tired. That kid is never fatigued or tired and for her to step up and really ice the game, she’s been doing that all year for us.”

King went head-to-head with WSU’s Williams for a good portion of the game. They both paced their respective teams in scoring in the first half, as King had 10 points and Williams had 11.

But King got the better of their matchup in the second half, as the Penguins limited Williams to three second-half points.

With YSU coming out of halftime with just a one-point lead, King knocked down back-to-back threes to open the second half to give the Penguins some breathing room.

“Because they were on Casey so much, my coach told me, ‘you’ll have to take the ball out and bring it up sometimes.’ So I was already prepared to bring it up and run a couple plays, and I’m just happy I was able to do that for my team,” King said. “I feel like it was rocky at the start with our team (offensively), so seeing those two shots go in at the beginning of the third felt really good. I felt like it got us on a roll to where we were able to create more of a gap between us and the other team.”

YSU outscored the Raiders 46-31 in the second half. King’s two 3-pointers, plus a pair of threes from Danielle Cameron helped the Penguins in the third quarter.

Then after Cameron went down with a minor injury, Hayden Barrier came in and immediately gave YSU a much-needed spark in the final period.

With the Penguins leading 59-45 with just under eight minutes left, the Raiders went on an 8-0 run to tighten things up. Barrier hit back-to-back threes to stop the bleeding and push YSU’s lead back to double digits.

She finished with eight points in that fourth quarter to help the Penguins close things out.

“At the beginning of the game, Coach Jackson told us all to play with a lot of confidence, so I think that was carrying over when I subbed in,” Barrier said. “I think we were doing a really good job of communicating the digs and that’s why those (3-point) shots were there. Big shout out to Sarah for getting the ball out to me when she noticed the dig. I think we were just playing together and communicating.”