SPRINGFIELD, Mo. – Despite shooting just over 35 percent from the floor, the Missouri State Lady Bears closed out the home portion of their schedule in style with a 73-65 victory over Creighton Sunday (Feb. 27) afternoon at JQH Arena. The Lady Bears used an 11-2 scoring run early in the second half to take control of the game, then withstood a late CU charge to send seniors Kendra Roberts and Jacque Griggs out on a high note.
Roberts came prepared for the occasion, sparking the Lady Bear offense early before finishing with 11 points and a career-best six rebounds to help Missouri State notch its fourth straight win on Senior Day.
The positive outcome was made possible by Missouri State’s work on the interior, led by a team-high 16 points from Christiana Shorter. The Lady Bears outscored the Bluejays by nearly a two-to-one margin in the paint (34-18) and pulled down 20 offensive boards, which they converted into 18 second-chance points. MSU’s post presence was evident during its critical run in which the Lady Bears scored 10 points in the paint over a three-and-a-half minute span early in the second half to turn a 40-37 contest into a 12-point MSU lead.
Leading that charge was Casey Garrison, who accounted for seven of MSU’s 11 points during the run after missing her first eight field goal attempts of the game. The junior guard would total 11 of her 13 points in the second stanza and record her first double-double of 2010-11 with a season-and game-high 10 rebounds.
Even after stretching their three-point halftime lead into double digits early in the second period, the Lady Bears would be forced to come up with another big run late in the game to pull out the victory. Creighton got hot from long range, as Kelsey Woodard knocked down the first of four eventual Bluejay three-point field goals over a span of just 1:58 to pull the visitors all the way back to within three points with just over 10 minutes to play. CU drew to within 62-60 on a Carli Tritz basket with just over five minutes remaining on the clock, but the Lady Bear defense would step up to the challenge in crunch time. MSU held the Bluejays without a field goal for nearly four minutes, while the offense expanded the margin back to nine points to effectively seal the win. Garrison started the spurt with a running left-hander in the lane, and Shorter added a basket on a put-back of a Garrison miss to push the lead to six points with 3:20 to go.
Missouri State, which struggled from the foul line in the second half (11-of-20), scored its final seven points of the game at the charity stripe, including four by Shorter.
The Lady Bears took a 35-32 lead into intermission, despite going just 10-for-30 (.333) from the floor in the opening period. Shorter tallied 10 points, and Roberts added nine off the MSU bench to lead the way in a back-and-forth first 20 minutes. 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 capped the scoring with a three-point play with 49 seconds left in the period. Neither team led by more than five points in a half that featured 10 ties and four lead changes.
The Lady Bears got off to a strong start, scoring six of the first eight points of the game. 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 13 minutes remaining on the clock.
Woodard would begin and end a 12-5 Creighton run with three-pointers, the first of which came at the 11:43 mark, followed by the capper 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, and 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.
In addition to Roberts’s effort, Jaleshia Roberson gave Missouri State a lift off the bench as well, posting her second straight double-digit scoring game with an 11-point day after going 2-for-3 from three-point range. On the strength of those two performances, the Lady Bear reserves outscored CU’s bench by a 29-14 margin.
CU shot .400 (22-of-55) from the field, and was led by Woodard’s 22 points and nine rebounds. The senior guard hit on 5-of-10 tries from beyond the arc to keep the Jays in the contest in the second half.
The Bluejays (18-10, 12-5 MVC) registered a season-high for blocked shots with 12, tying a JQH Arena single-game record in the process.
With the victory, the Lady Bears (19-9, 10-6 MVC) inched closer to their second consecutive 20-win season and the 16th in the 42-year history of the program. They’ll hit the road for their final two Valley contests of the season, beginning with Thursday’s (March 3) 7 p.m. game at Evansville. MSU will then close out the regular season Saturday (March 5) at Southern Illinois in a 2:05 p.m. game.
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