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The Lady Bear Necessities
- Missouri State women's basketball got back in the win column on Friday night with a 76-61 win over Indiana State. The Lady Bears welcome Evansville to Great Southern Bank Arena on Super Bowl Sunday afternoon (2 p.m.) in the annual Play4Kay game. MoState leads the all-time series against Evansville, 53-13, including a 28-2 record at home. The Lady Bears have won the last 15 meetings in the series.
- The Lady Bears are the only team remaining in The Valley with an undefeated record at home (10-0). In home games, MoState owns a +17.6 scoring margin, +7.4 rebounding margin and is holding opponents to just 55.4 points/game. Sarah Linthacum leads the way in home games with 12.8 points/game and a .609 (53-87) FG%, while Lacy Stokes owns a 3.2 assist-to-turnover ratio in front of her home crowd.
- Lainie Douglas (Fr., Overland Park, Kan.) was named MVC Freshman of the Week for the second consecutive week. In a weekend split at Bradley and Illinois State, she averaged 9.5 points and 4.0 rebounds per game, while shooting .750 (9-12 FG) in 11.9 minutes per game off the bench. In her first-career start on Friday night, Douglas posted a career-high 20 points and added nine rebounds.
- Linthacum (Sr., Jefferson City, Mo.) leads the Lady Bears with a .566 FG% (112-198), which ranks 31st nationally. She is MoState's second-leading scorer at 11.6 points/game and leads the team with 50 offensive rebounds. Linthacum missed Friday's game against Indiana State due to injury.
- Stokes (Sr., Mount Vernon, Mo.) continues to do it all for Missouri State from the point guard position. Stokes leads the team in scoring (12.5 ppg), assists (90), steals (50), free throw percentage (.778) and minutes (34.1 mpg).
- Paige Rocca (Sr., Iowa City, Iowa) has played in 131 games at MSU, which is tied for 3rd in program history. With an appearance against Evansville, she will move into solo third place.
- Spectacular Sophomores - Sophomores Kaemyn Bekemeier (10.6 ppg) and Kyrah Daniels (11.5 ppg) are two of four Lady Bears averaging double-figure points this season, and they rank first and third on the team in rebounding with 132 and 119 boards, respectively. Bekemeier is tied for the team lead in FT% (.778) and is 4th in 3FG% (.338), while Daniels leads the team in 3FGM (42) and 2nd in BLK (16).
- A couple of keys to success for Missouri State this season have been:
- Getting off to a quick start: 16-1 when leading at the half and are 1-4 when trailing at the break.
- Bench production: 12-1 this season when leading in bench scoring.
- In the Cunningham era, Missouri State is 39-4 when scoring 70+ points, 44-1 when holding opponents to 65 points or less and 33-0 when opponents score less than 60 points.
The Series
Missouri State leads the all-time series 53-13 against Evansville, which includes a 28-2 record at home. The Lady Bears have won the last 15 meetings in the series as their last loss to the Purple Aces came on 3/10/17 in the MVC Tournament, 65-59.
In last season's meeting in Springfield, the Lady Bears dominated en route to a 35-point, 90-55, victory. Missouri State jumped out to a 13-0 lead to begin the game and never looked back. MoState had five players reach double-figure points, while all 14 players on last year's roster recorded a rebound in the win.
Earlier this season when the two teams met in Evansville, Missouri State led wire-to-wire in a 27-point victory. With a 68-45 lead at the beginning of the fourth quarter, the Lady Bears held the Purple Aces to just 3-for-11 (.273) from the field over the final 10 minutes to cruise to victory.
Sarah Linthacum led the way with 19 points (9-11 FG), while a total of four Lady Bears reached double-figure points.
