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Jasmine Alston Winding Down Impressive Career At La Salle

PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- The La Salle University women's basketball team has enjoyed a pretty remarkable turnaround this season.

After going 5-25 during the 2015-16 campaign, La Salle this season is 17-12 and getting ready to take on St. Joe's on Friday night down in Richmond, Virginia in the quarterfinals of the A-10 Tournament.

The Explorers have several talented seniors helping to lead the way this season, and right at the top of that list is guard Jasmine Alston.
A native of Long Island City, New York, Alston leads the Explorers in rebounding (8.7 rpg), assists (210) and steals (72) and she is tied for third on the team in scoring, averaging 8.0 points per game.

"Definitely coming off of last year's disappointment, we definitely wanted to step it up and go out with a bang," Alston tells KYW Newsradio. "Especially from our senior class. No one transferred out, we were just trying to make an impact here and probably start La Salle off, kick it off to being better in the years to come."

Listen to the entire interview with La Salle's Jasmine Alston:

 

She talks about when the turnaround really started for the team.

"I think when we started holding each other more accountable," Alston says. "We started off the season 0-3 and it was almost like a flashback, like, 'Wow, guys, nothing has changed.' We had to have a team meeting and we really had to tell each other each other's roles. Then we won the next (three games) and we figured out we can do this. If we compete, we come down to the wire, we have to put everything on the line and it just started rolling for us."

Alston has had quite the impact on the La Salle program. She is the all-time steals leader at La Salle (266) and she is currently second in program history in assists with 596 and fifth in rebounding with 786.

She says her focus right now is pretty simple.

"I'm just trying to zone in on getting this next win and just keeping our season alive, keeping it going," Alston says.

La Salle and St. Joe's will start at 7:00pm on Friday night.

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