WACO, Texas - The Idaho offense that had sputtered through the first five games was nowhere to be found on Sunday morning in a 90-66 Vandal victory over Louisiana-Lafayette at the World Vision Classic.

In its place was an efficient, balanced scoring machine, as Idaho (1-5) hit from everywhere on the floor and overwhelmed Louisiana-Lafayette (1-4) on the offensive side of the ball. The Vandals did it, also, without head coach Jon Newlee on the bench.

Newlee fell ill late Saturday night and wasn't able to attend the game, so associate head coach Gavin Petersen, for the second time in his career, stepped in as acting coach. Petersen's previous experience as acting coach was a double-overtime loss to Boise State in 2006 when he was associate head coach at Idaho State under Newlee.

"We went along with everything as usual from pregame meal, right into film," Petersen said. "Everything was business as usual and we tried to keep it as normal as possible."

Newlee said that even though the team found out that he wouldn't be there just a few hours before the game, he had no concerns about his staff's ability to get things done.

"I had all the confidence in the world that it was going to be business as usual," Newlee said. "When I won the WAC Coach of the Year award last year, I said it was a staff award and today shows how true that is."

The incident didn't ruffle the Vandal players, either. Senior Charlotte Otero and sophomore Shaena Kuehu put in career highs of 15 and 20 points, respectively, while juniors Rachele Kloke and Yinka Olorunnife came up just short of career pace with 19 points each.

As a team, Idaho assaulted the net with a 53.3 shooting percentage from the field, while holding the Ragin' Cajuns to a 37.9 shooting clip and a 17.4 percent 3-point percentage. The Vandals turned 22 Louisiana turnovers into 24 points and outscored the Cajuns 10-0 in the fast break department.

"I think the key today was definitely defense," Petersen said. "We rotated well in our zone, got out to shooters and made them rush their shots at times, then we got running."

Idaho broke out in the second half with 55 points on 63.3 percent shooting, including 7-of-12 (.583) from 3-point range. That is Idaho's highest-scoring half since the Vandals had 56 in the first half of a 99-70 win at Utah Valley on Dec. 8, 2005. Idaho's 90 points on Sunday are also the most in a game since the win over UVU.

"We told them to attack them and not play on their heels, and that's what happened today on the basketball court," Petersen said. "It's good for them to know that if they play team basketball, share the basketball and take good shots, this kind of thing can happen. We played extremely well tonight as team offensively."

Otero dished a season-high six assists and grabbed two steals in the game, while Kuehu had a career-high eight made field goals, two assists, two rebounds, two steals and one block. Kloke tied career highs with eight rebounds, eight field goals made and three assists. Olorunnife was a crisp 7-of-9 from the field and 2-of-2 from downtown with nine rebounds.

For the Ragin' Cajuns, forward Alexis Green did most of the damage, as she recorded an 18-point, 10-rebound double-double. Jamie Gunter kicked in 10 points, but no other ULL player hit double digits and the Cajuns only had seven assists. Offensive rebounds kept the Cajuns in the game, as they outscored Idaho 21-13 on second-chance points.

The game featured three ties and six lead changes, but all of them took place in the first nine minutes of the game. After that, it was all Vandals. While trailing 12-9 at the 12:40 mark of the first half, a Kloke jumper keyed an Idaho 14-5 run to put the Vandals up for good at 23-17 with 6:46 left in the first.

After a made free throw by the Cajuns, Otero nailed a triple to give Idaho a 26-18 lead at the 5:49 mark. The Vandals would settle for a 35-28 halftime lead after a Kuehu layup with 25 seconds remaining in the first.

Kuehu opened the second half with eight straight points to put the Vandals up 43-30, then Idaho poured it on. The Vandals made eight of their first 12 shots in the second half, five of which were 3-pointers. On the other side, Louisiana was just 4-of-11 and had three turnovers during the same time span. The result was Idaho opening up a 58-36 at the 12:31 mark.

ULL's Green converted a three-point play at the 12:07 mark to bring the score to 58-39, but Idaho responded by going on an 11-0 run to give the team a 30-point lead, its biggest of the season, at 69-39 with 9:20 left in the game.

The Cajuns used a 19-4 run to get themselves back in to striking distance at 73-58 with 5:20 left, but then Idaho closed out the game on a 12-4 run to seal the deal.

"Last time we did that (played with a lead) was at Eastern Washington, and that didn't turn out too well, because we panicked under fire," Petersen said. "It was nice to see that the girls responded today, even though Louisiana cut into our lead at one point in the second half.

"We took care of the ball down the stretch, even though things were going bad at one point, so it was good to see that we were able to respond to that situation."

With some much-needed momentum on their side, the Vandal women will now return home for a four-game home stand, starting on Tuesday against Colorado State, followed by Wyoming on Thursday, St. Mary's on Sunday and Portland on Dec. 11. All four games will be played at Memorial Gym.