NORMAL, Ill. — For about a full half, it was looking as if the terrible women’s basketball losing streak for Murray State might end in a fashion that would stun the entire Missouri Valley Conference.
The Racers took as large as a 14-point lead against The Valley’s top team — defending Valley Tournament champion Illinois State and had the Redbirds on their heels. Then, Illinois State began finding its usual form toward the end of the first half, cutting the lead to only five points.
And that carried over to a third quarter in which the Redbirds seemingly could not miss and the Racers could not keep pace as Illinois State took a 14-point lead to the final quarter, then fought off a furious comeback attempt from the Racers in a hard-fought 79-73 win at CEFCU Arena in Normal.
“They’re a very, very good third quarter team. Coach Gillespie does great job of making adjustments and when they get hot, they can make shots from anywhere,” said Murray State Head Coach Rechelle Turner, whose team dropped its sixth straight game to fall to 11-10 overall and 4-8 in Valley play on a day it was on the wrong end of a major foul discrepancy — 24-9 — that resulted in huge foul trouble, as well as a 48-18 loss in paint points.
“I did feel like the whistle got us in foul trouble, but I think the whistle also kind of helped us realize who wants to play and I thought our kids off the bench gave a really good effort and never stopped playing until the final buzzer.
This game turned in the final three minutes of the second quarter as Illinois State (17-5, 11-1 in The Valley) went from trailing 38-27 to only 44-39 at halftime with its main weapon — former NCAA Division 2 All-American guard Paige Robinson leading the charge with 10 of game-high 24 points in that stretch.
Now feeling more confident, the Redbirds began to go to work in the third quarter. After Murray State forward Katelyn Young, saddled by foul trouble all day, gave her team a 49-45 lead on an inside score, the Redbirds exploded, going on a 13-0 run that was capped by an inside score from forward Deanna Wilson that put them up, 58-49 with about four minutes left. Threes from guard Mary Crompton and Robinson increased the lead to 64-52 and a forward Ta’Shonna Wright-Gaskins’ score after she blocked a Racer trey try into back court left the score 66-52, heading to the final stanza.
Instead of folding, though, the Racers fought and actually had the lead down to as little as 78-73 on a Young putback with 1:03 left. However, chances to increase the pressure on the Redbirds resulted in misses.
“The third quarter was dismal,” Turner said of the Redbirds going 12-of-17 from the field. “That’s on me. I went with our starters, and I should’ve stayed with the ones that were giving the most effort. We didn’t guard anybody for five minutes of that quarter and I believe that was the only quarter we lost today.”
Reserve guard Briley Pena had her best game this season with 12 points, all on 3-pointers and all coming in the first half. Guard Cayson Conner had five points and four rebounds off the bench and forward Jaidah Black had four points and six rebounds.
However, the Racers’ main weapons were also strong as forward Hannah McKay narrowly missed a double-double with eight points and 10 rebounds, Young, who eventually fouled out, still managed to score 13 points and grab six rebounds and guard Macey Turley had a team-high 22 points and four boards as she took the school lead in all-time double-digit scoring games with 105, passing Ke’Shunna James.
Commented
Sorry, there are no recent results for popular commented articles.