Tulsa Women Fall 63-61 at Missouri State in Hard-Fought Road Test

Sunday, November 10

Springfield, Mo.

2:00 p.m.

Tulsa

1-1,0-0AAC

Missouri State

1-0,0-0MVC

Tulsa

Missouri St.

Photo by: Ali Zamudio

Tulsa Women Fall 63-61 at Missouri State in Hard-Fought Road Test

11/10/2024 6:20:00 PM | Women's Basketball

Box Score Box Score (PDF)Season Stats (PDF)

SPRINGFIELD, Mo. — The Tulsa women's basketball team fell by two points in a hotly-contested 63-61 road battle at Missouri State Sunday afternoon in Springfield. It was a tough environment for the Golden Hurricane who couldn't put away a pesky Bears team in their season-opener. TU dropped to 1-1 on the young season and Missouri State started their year with a win.

Sophomore Elise Hill was the team's offensive leader with three assists and 12 points resulting from 5-of-11 field goals made, 1-for-4 in three-pointers and 1-for-3 in free throws. Sophomore Jade Clack finished with a career-high 11 points, reaching double-digits for the first time in her career spanning Tulsa and TCU.

Clack also tied the team-high in rebounds with senior Lexie Foutch with five each, while Hill and senior Kristol Ayson each had three steals.

Tulsa didn't get the start it wanted after trailing early and playing from behind from the 8:06 mark in the first quarter to the 3:27 mark in the third quarter. TU trailed by as many as 13 points at 39-26 with 1:33 remaining in the first half.

A huge 14-5 scoring run to start the third quarter allowed Tulsa to tie things up at 44-44 halfway through the third frame. Although TU never led by more than one point in the second half, the second half was tightly contested and could have ended in the Hurricane's favor in the end.

Down 63-61 with 3.7 seconds left, Tulsa made the call to inbound the ball to Delanie Crawford who attempted the game-tying layup, but the referee at the baseline called a charge on her, effectively ending the Hurricane's hopes of saving the game.

"Our team did such a great job executing on that last play," Head Coach Angie Nelp said. "Before we called that next timeout, we had struggled a bit on the inbounds we didn't do what we needed to do to get the ball in the right place at the right time, so we called another quick one. We felt good about the play we were going to run and I thought it went well. We did what we were supposed to do. Regardless of that last play, there were so many controllables throughout the game that we're going to have to look back and learn and grow from. We're going to have the ability to understand that games are not the first and last possession, it's every detail in between. We lost the war on the boards today, so we know there are a lot of growth areas for us. We had a few more turnovers than we wanted but we also forced a lot of turnovers. There were some good things and there were some ugly things. Defending without fouling will be key for us moving forward as well."

Tulsa has now had to erase deficits of 13 or more points in back-to-back games to open the season. Had Tulsa pulled off the comeback win over the Bears, it would have been the first time since last season against UAB (15-point comeback) and South Florida (16-point comeback) that TU had comeback victories.

A key difference in Sunday's loss was free throw shooting by Tulsa as the Hurricane made just 9-of-22 attempted free throws throughout the contest. With no field goals by either team in the final 4:48 of the game, just three more made free throws would have won the game for Tulsa in that stretch, where the Hurricane went 3-of-6 from the line.

Missouri State also outrebounded the Hurricane 45-35 by the end of the game. At the half, the Bears were winning the board battle 27-13.

Paige Rocca led the Bears with 15 points with Lacy Stokes and Sarah Linthacum each scoring 10. Linthacum had a double-double as she also led Missouri State with 11 boards.

HOW IT HAPPENED
IN THE FIRST QUARTER . . .
Tulsa scored first with a three-pointer from the baseline by Delanie Crawford. Elise Hill added her first trey of the game after Missouri State made a three to give TU a 6-3 lead. Jade Clack added Tulsa's third three in the early stretch

The Bears then scored seven unanswered points to take a four-point lead at 10-6 and kept that advantage through 12-8. A three-pointer by MSU's Lacy Stokes then made it a 15-9 contest at 5:49.

An 11-2 scoring run by Lady Bears made it a 21-11 ballgame early, but TU was able to take advantage of a 3:02 Missouri State field goal drought to fight back to a six point deficit at 23-17 Bears with 1:05 left.

MSU then scored five off a layup and a three pointer to end the first quarter with the lead over Tulsa, 28-17

IN THE SECOND QUARTER . . .
Tulsa opened the second period on a 5-2 run with two layups by Elise Hill and a free throw by Jade Clack.

Three Hurricane turnovers in a 2:57 span contributed to a scoring drought for TU, but the Bears weren't handling the ball well either, turning it over four times in four minutes.

Perimeter defenses tightened up as neither team made a three-pointer in the quarter.

Missouri State gained its biggest lead of the game (13 points) at 1:33 when Paige Rocca made her fourth consecutive free throw to give the Bears a 39-26 advantage. A Kristol Ayson jumper and Cam Mathews layup in the final 1:16 of the quarter trimmed TU's deficit to nine at 39-30 entering halftime.

At the half, Tulsa was right behind Missouri State with 38.7% shooting (12-31), 21.4% in threes (3-14) and 33.3% in free throws (3-9). The Bears were making 40% of their shots (12-30), 44.4% in three-pointers (4-9) and 91.7 (11-12).

Missouri State got to the line often and shot the ball effectively from the stripe. That, along with out-rebounding the Hurricane 27-13 made the biggest difference in the first half.

IN THE THIRD QUARTER . . .
After Missouri State opened the second-half scoring on a two-point jump shot, Tulsa responded with a 9-0 scoring run over a 2:31 span fueled by baskets from four different Hurricane, including layups by Delanie Crawford an Kristol Ayson, a jumper by Paige Bradley and a Mady Cartwright three-pointer to make it just a 41-39 ballgame.

Tulsa grabbed its first lead since the 8:06 mark in the first quarter when Paige Bradley sank a free throw at 3:27 give the Hurricane a 46-45 lead. She had made a three-pointer right before that at 5:27 to tie up the game at 44-44.

Missouri State was able to snap out of its scoring drought with a 6-0 run, to which Lexie Foutch answered with a three and McKayla Miller scored a point from the charity stripe to make it a 50-48 score with Missouri State leading heading into the fourth quarter.

IN THE FOURTH QUARTER . . .
Kristol Ayson scored first for TU with an unassisted layup to tie it up once again at 50-50 at 8:38.

Jade Clack's three-pointer at 6:18 and layup at 5:47 tied the ballgame up twice more at 55-55 and 57-57 as Missouri State kept finding answers to Tulsa's scoring.

Elise Hill finally gave the Hurricane its first lead of the quarter at 58-57 with a free throw but it was immediately answered back with a Bears' three.

TU's defense tightened up as Mady Cartwright drew a late-game charge at 2:28 and scored one from the line to knot things up again at 60-60.

Fouling out with just 1:48 left was Lexie Foutch. She was responsible for five rebounds at that point in the contest. Mady Cartwright exited with five fouls with 58 seconds left with six points and four boards.

The Hurricane missed six consecutive field goals in a 5:30 stretch while Missouri State was also in a scoring drought for 3:50 of that span, due in part to four turnovers. The Bears also went 0-4 on field goals to close out the game.

Two Missouri State free throws following the technical foul by Cartwright put the Bears up 62-60 with 58 seconds to go. Delanie Crawford got herself to the line but made one of two shots to make it a 62-61 contest with 20.5 seconds remaining.

Tulsa called back-to-back timeouts after MSU went 1-2 at the line at 0:17.6. The Hurricane was unable to score on the ensuing play and committed a foul trying to go for the jump ball. Thankfully, Missouri State missed the resulting free throws and TU had one more chance to tie or take the lead with the scoreboard reading 63-61 Missouri State with only 3.7 seconds to go.

It was Delanie Crawford who fielded the inbound, but the referee at the baseline called an offensive foul on the attempted game-winning layup. Although Tulsa benefitted from two missed free throws by MSU's Kiley Bess, there was no time to come back as the game ended in a 63-61 loss for TU.

Tulsa missed its last seven field goals and went 2-10 in its last 12 attempts, while Missouri State went 0-4 in their final attempts from the field. It was all free throws as neither team could score from the field in the final 4:48 of the game. TU went 4-9 in free throws and MSU went 3-12 from the charity stripe it the final frame.

GAME NOTES

The all-time series with Missouri State moved to 9-7 in favor of the Bears.
Sophomore Elise Hill recorded her second double-digit scoring contest of the year and fifth of her career with 12 points.
Sophomore Jade Clack notched her first career double-figure scoring game with 11 points. It's a career-high mark for the transfer from TCU.
Senior Delanie Crawford's eight points moves her to 1,222 career points, ranking ninth on the all-time TU scoring chart ‚ she needs 80 points to pass Lila Osceola's (1996-00) 1,301 points.
Tulsa outscored UAPB 15-5 in the fourth quarter.
True freshmen Brooklyn Alexander, Whitney Sullivan and Brynn Eshoo all made their first appearances for the Hurricane.
Missouri State finished with 10 more boards than TU, 45-35.
9-22 free throw shooting (40.9%) for the Hurricane proved to be one of the biggest difference makers in the game.
Tulsa's opponents in the first two games this season have turned over the ball over 20 times with UAPB giving up the ball 22 times and Missouri State 23 times.
Sunday was the first time Tulsa had three players or more disqualified since Jan. 23, 2011 against Tulane (13 years). Mady Cartwright, Lexie Foutch and Delanie Crawford all exited in the final two minutes of the contest.

The Hurricane will try to reclaim the Mayor's Cup when they host cross-town rival Oral Roberts this Sunday, Nov. 17, at 2 p.m. in the Donald W. Reynolds Center.
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