SPRINGFIELD, Mo. – Despite shooting just .333 from the floor, the Missouri State Lady Bears took a 35-32 lead over Creighton into the halftime locker room Sunday afternoon at JQH Arena.
Christiana Shorter tallied 10 points, and
Kendra Roberts added nine off the MSU bench to lead the Lady Bears.
MSU scored seven of the last nine points of the half to gain the upper hand, with Roberts accounting for the first four, and Shorter capping the first-half scoring with a three-point play with 49 seconds to play in the period.
The Lady Bears were able to take the slim lead into the break despite getting just two points from leading scorer
Casey Garrison, who struggled through an 0-for-7 shooting performance to open the game. Neither team led by more than five points in a half that featured 10 ties and four lead changes.
CU shot .414 (12-of-29) from the field, and was led by Kelsey Woodard’s 10 points.
The Lady Bears got off to a strong start, scoring six of the first eight points of the contest. CU responded with four straight points from Kellie Nelson to knot the score, but MSU scored five of the next seven points to claim a 13-8 advantage with just13 minutes remaining on the clock.
But the Jays turned in a 12-5 scoring spurt, highlighted by a Woodard three with 7:15 to play that gave CU its biggest lead of the half at 20-17.
Roberts quickly responded for MSU with a trey of her own just 20 seconds later. The two teams would trade blows for the ensuing four minutes, until another Roberts bucket at the 2:05 mark spurred MSU’s late run.
The Lady Bears cashed in at the foul line over the game’s first 20 minutes, going 13-of-15 (.867) at the charity stripe. MSU also outrebounded the Bluejays by a 21-18 margin.
