Western Kentucky secured the top seed in next week’s Conference USA Tournament and earned at least a share of the regular-season championship with a 75-55 win over North Texas on Thursday in Denton, Texas.

Redshirt senior and C-USA Player of the Year candidate Kendall Noble had a near-triple-double effort with 21 points, nine rebounds and seven assists to help the Lady Toppers (23-6 overall, 15-2 Conference USA) clinch the No. 1 seed in the C-USA Tournament with one regular-season game remaining by virtue of holding the tiebreaker over second-place Middle Tennessee.

WKU has now finished atop C-USA in two of its three seasons in the league.

WKU will complete its regular season at 2 p.m. Saturday as the Lady Toppers round out their Texas road swing at Rice in Houston. With a win, WKU would clinch the outright C-USA regular-season championship heading into next week’s C-USA Tournament in Birmingham, Ala.

Ivy Brown earned her eighth double-double of the season with 12 points and 14 rebounds, and both Kayla Smith (13) and Tashia Brown (11) also reached double figures for the Lady Toppers.

Terriell Bradley was the lone North Texas (11-17, 8-9) player in double figures with 18 points. Jada Poland had a team-best 10 rebounds for the Mean Green.

WKU jumped out to a 5-2 lead over the first two minutes, but an 8-0 run by the Mean Green over the following two minutes left the Lady Toppers with a 10-5 deficit. Bradley and Candice Adams each knocked down a 3-pointer during the run for North Texas, with Adams’ triple closing the stretch at the 6:08 mark.

After North Texas pushed its lead to seven points, 14-7, WKU fired back by closing the first quarter on a 14-1 run. Five Lady Toppers scored during the run, including 3-pointers from Sidnee Bopp and Micah Jones. Noble also pitched in four points over the final four minutes of the frame to give WKU a 21-15 lead after the opening 10 minutes.

WKU’s lead grew to double digits midway through the second quarter, spurred by a 10-2 run over a four-minute span. Leading 27-20 after a 3-pointer from North Texas’ Bradley, four Lady Toppers keyed the stretch, including a pair of free throws from Ivy Brown after North Texas was whistled for a technical foul. Those shots from the free-throw line left WKU with its largest lead of the night to that point, 37-22.

North Texas whittled WKU’s lead to 12 points in the final minute, but a pair of late free throws from Noble sent WKU into the halftime break with a 43-29 lead.

North Texas scored the first four points of the third quarter to cut WKU’s lead to 10 points with baskets from Kelsey Criner and Terra Ellison. Two more times over the next three minutes, the Mean Green pulled within 10 points but could not cut the deficit to single digits.

In the fourth quarter, North Texas again managed to cut the gap to 13 points, 61-48, with five straight points on a 3-pointer by Adams and two free throws by Criner. WKU finished the game on a 6-0 run over the final two minutes, including four points from Noble, to secure the 75-55 victory.{&end}