Bulldogs out-played in loss to Tigers
Earlier this year, Mississippi State coach Nikki Mccray-penson stated that she felt her team would be playing its best basketball in February and March, but Sunday was a Bulldog team at its worst in the last game of the regular season.
The Bulldogs were coming off of two-straight wins over Auburn and LSU and had a chance for a thirdstraight against a Missouri team under .500 in the league. Instead, State got outplayed in every facet and run off the Humphrey Coliseum court in a 77-57 loss.
It was a game that saw leading scorer Rickea Jackson and bench player Jamya Mingo-young on the bench for two and a half quarters and Missouri took full command. More effort on both sides of the ball went a long way for the Tigers in the blowout win.
Mccray-penson said that Jackson and Mingo-young were out because the coach “wanted to stay focused on our seniors.”
MSU hasn’t gotten off to good starts on the court in each of the last eight games, but the Bulldogs have had better starts. That ended on Sunday as State struggled in all four quarters. Missouri came out hot offensively and took a 17-12 lead in the first quarter, but it really pushed the game out in the second by outscoring the Bulldogs 23-12 in the second quarter and going up 40-24 at the half.
State got the lead down to 12 on a couple of occasions but Missouri remained in control all game long. The effort and intensity by the Tigers was never matched by MSU as it was destroyed on the boards.
Despite the size advantage, the Bulldogs were beaten 46-31 in rebounds and gave up 13 offensive boards. They won the points in the paint 42-26, but the Tigers were more aggressive in getting the ball off the rim.
“I can go back to our last two games – we had tremendous energy and effort, especially in the third quarter,” Mccray-penson said. “We boxed out when we needed to. Boxing out is something that we talked about all week long. They beat us to balls because we were in rotation. You’ve got to decide to box out. As a player, you have to decide to box out. It’s a decision.”
Along with the rebounding issues, 3-point shooting played a major part in the loss. Missouri made 12-of-30 of those and State couldn’t hit as it went 3-for22. MSU was also just 6-of15 from the free-throw line a
game after making 13-of-14 against LSU.
Myah Taylor was the only State player in double figures with 11 points on 3-of5 shooting and she had just one turnover in 34 minutes.
Jackson scored six point in 11 minutes and had three turnovers and zero rebounds. Jessika Carter struggled mightily even with the size advantage with six points on 3-of-12 shooting and five rebounds in 20 minutes.
Next up for State (10-8, 5-7 SEC) is the conference tournament in Greenville, S.C. The Bulldogs have made it to the championship game in five-straight seasons, but that streak is in serious jeopardy as they will be playing the in No. 8/No. 9 matchup against LSU at 10 a.m. on Thursday morning.
Mccray-penson is challenging her team to move on from the final game and push forward as postseason play begins.
“Hats off to Missouri,” Mccray-penson said. “They came in here and just whipped us. We were not the team that played the last two games. We’ve just got to go back to the drawing board. It’s a new season as we go into the SEC (Tournament) and we’ve got to regroup and get ready for that.”