Murray State
Southeast Missouri State
Second-half woes vs. SEMO strike again in 71-52 loss
1/28/2006 6:00:00 AM | Women's Basketball
The loss put Murray State (6-12, 5-6 OVC) into a three-way tie for sixth with Morehead State, which lost at Eastern Illinois (8-4 OVC) 69-68 tonight, and Eastern Kentucky, which was idle tonight. SEMO (12-6, 9-3 OVC) moved into a three-way tie for first place with Samford, which lost 60-59 in overtime to Austin Peay (6-5 OVC) tonight, and Tennessee Tech, which beat Tennessee State (0-11 OVC) 79-53. In other OVC action, Jacksonville State (4-8 OVC) beat Tennessee-Martin (3-8 OVC) 84-55.
Murray State should hold onto its status as the best free-throw-shooting team in the nation (NCAA Division I) for the fourth straight week, as the Lady Racers shot 82.4 percent (14-for-17) from the line tonight. National rankings will be issued by the NCAA on Tuesday.
Against SEMO, the Lady Racers opened the game with aggressive play, but made 14 turnovers in the first half. MSU held the Redhawks to 34.5-percent shooting (10-for-29) in the first period and trailed by a scant 31-30 margin at halftime.
In the second half, Murray State just couldn't find the basket, hitting on only one of its first nine shots of the second half and making eight of its 28 second-half attempts (28.6 percent).
MSU finished the game with 25 turnovers to SEMO's 19 and was out-rebounded by the Redhawks 44-32, with a 27-13 difference in the second half.
"I told our players that the key to the game was rebounding," said MSU head coach Joi Felton. "At halftime, we were pretty pleased. We were down by one, and we were out-rebounding them (19-17), and that's what keeps the game close. I told our players that defensive rebounding would win us games on the road, especially against a quality team like SEMO. We just didn't get it done today. We didn't do a good job of keeping SEMO off the boards. We didn't play as hard and aggressive, and that was disappointing, coming off the win we had Thursday (against Tennessee Tech).
"That many turnovers will not win you ball games. We had seven assists and 25 turnovers, and that translates into a loss. We've got to go back to work. We've got one day to prepare for Samford. We've got to learn from this, and we've got to move on to the next game."
Murray State returns home to take on OVC co-leader Samford (14-5, 9-3 OVC) on Monday at 5:15 p.m. in MSU's Regional Special Events Center.
"We play well at home," Felton said. "The last time we played at Samford, we didn't feel like we played a full 40 minutes like we can. Any time we play a full 40 minutes, I feel like we put ourselves in a position to win. We didn't do that tonight, and that was disappointing."
Murray State was led by junior forward Joi Scott, who had 12 points on 5-for-7 shooting from the field and eight rebounds, both team-highs. Junior guard/forward Gerraca Matthews added 10 points, hitting all four of her free-throw attempts.
Southeast Missouri was paced by Tatiana Conceicao, who had 21 points to go with five rebounds. Simone Jackson added 13 points, five rebounds and four assists, while Lachelle Lyles had a double-double with 12 points and 11 rebounds. Tiffanne Ryan put in 10 points for SEMO.
