The Lady Bear Necessities
- Missouri State women's basketball is set to tip off the 2023-24 season on the road with a Monday night (5 p.m.) contest at Little Rock. The Lady Bears have won the last three matchups against the Trojans and are looking for their first consecutive road wins in the history of the series.
- Head coach Beth Cunningham enters her second season at the helm of the Lady Bears program. In her first season, she led the Lady Bears to a 20-12 overall record and a 14-6 ledger in the Missouri Valley Conference, as she became just the second head coach in program history to record at least 20 victories in year one.
- Missouri State was picked to finish 5th in this year's MVC Preseason Poll, with Jade Masogayo (So., Fort Worth, Texas) and Kennedy Taylor (Jr., Shawnee Mission, Kan.) earning preseason All-MVC second team nods.
- Masogayo was named the 2022-23 MVC Freshman of the Year, becoming the first Lady Bear to win the award since 2010 and the seventh in progam history to take home the award, after averaging 8.0 points and 5.4 rebounds per game with 44 blocked shots in her freshman campaign.
- Meanwhile, Taylor was named to the All-MVC third team and MVC All-Newcomer team a season ago after coming up just shy of averaging a double-double against MVC foes with 13.0 points and 9.2 rebounds per game in conference play. She led the Lady Bears last season with 11 double-doubles and ranked 13th nationally and 1st in the MVC in offensive rebounds per game (4.0).
- MSU returns six players (three starters) from a year ago, while welcoming a group of eight newcomers that consists of three transfers and five freshmen. Missouri State looks to build on the success of last season's impact transfers as they usher in DII All-American Lacy Stokes (Jr., Mount Vernon, Mo.) from Missouri Southern, as well as Katrine Jessen (Sr., Skovlunde, Denmark) and Angel Scott (Jr., Edmond, Okla.) from Kansas and Stephen F. Austin, respectively.
- Missouri State's five-member freshman class is its largest since the 2018-19 season.
- Carrying on a tradition of dominance on the glass, MSU returns 61 percent of its rebounding, including its top two rebounders in Taylor and Indya Green (Jr., Springfield, Mo.), from last year's squad that ranked 10th nationally in rebound margin (+8.9) and 26th in the country in rebounds per game (41.5).
- Missouri State has won three of its last five season openers with the Lady Bears' last season-opening victory coming at Little Rock on 11/9/21 by a score of 76-62.
The Series
Missouri State leads the all-time series against Little Rock, 14-4. However the Lady Bears are just 3-3 all time against the Trojans on the road. MSU is riding a three-game win streak in the series heading into Monday night's season-opening matchup.
Last season, the Lady Bears defeated the Trojans in Springfield, 55-48, in the final game of their non-conference slate. After leading by just one point at the half, MSU used a couple of second half surges and a 15-point fourth quarter performance from
Aniya Thomas to pull away from Little Rock and secure the victory. Thomas was the game's leading scorer with 19 points, followed by
Kennedy Taylor with 13 points and six rebounds.
Indya Green led the way on the glass, tallying a game high nine rebounds.
The last meeting between the two teams in Little Rock was on 11/9/21, the season opener in 2021-22. MSU once again used a late game surge to hold off the Trojans, putting together a 13-3 run over the final 5:09 of the game to win 76-62, after leading by just one point after three quarters on the road. At the time, the victory was MSU's 13th consecutive on the road, matching the program record. Mariah White scored a game-high 24 points in her Lady Bear debut, the most in a MSU debut since Gail Beck (24) on 11/18/80 vs. SEMO.
A Lady Bear Win Would...
• Stretch MSU's win streak against Little Rock to four games
• Mark the first season-opening victory under second-year head coach
Beth Cunningham and MSU's first since the 2021-22 season opener at Little Rock
• Secure the first consecutive road wins in the history of the series for MSU
• Would extend MSU's regular season, non-conference win streak to four games
