Tiger women lose SEC tourney opener, now have to wait
The Missouri women’s basketball team will have ten nervous days because of five minutes on Thursday afternoon. Mizzou was outscored 13-4 by Arkansas in overtime and fell 61-52 in its opening game at the SEC Tournament in Nashville.
The Tigers, one of the nation’s best shooting teams, shot just 29.9% for the game and made only two of nine shots in overtime. Arkansas took the lead for good on a Sasha Goforth three-pointer with 3:24 to play that was part of a 9-0 Razorback run. It was Arkansas’ last field goal, but the Razorbacks went 8-for-10 from the free throw line and Missouri was never closer than five points the rest of the way.
“I’ve got a pretty disappointed locker room in there,” Mizzou head coach Robin Pingeton said. “I love this team. The good news is this is not the end. We get a chance to spend some more time together.
“We can recharge our batteries, regroup and see where the chips fall.”
Haley Troup gave Missouri a shot most of the day with a career-high 21 points on 8-for-19 shooting. That included a layup with 20.3 seconds to go in regulation that tied the game at 48 and eventually sent it to overtime. Ladazhia Williams added 14 points and 13 rebounds for Mizzou. Other than those two, the Tigers combined to go 6-for-37 from the floor and scored just 17 points. Hayley Frank, coming off a 26-point, 10-rebound effort against Florida in the regular season finale, scored just five points in 40 minutes.
“This was not one of the prettier games that people have ever watched,” Pingeton said. “It was a muddy game on both ends offensively, but we had some looks and just didn’t convert. Probably the first time all year where our offense wasn’t in a flow where we just continued to battle on the defensive end.”
Missouri entered the game as the nation’s seventh-best three-point shooting team. The Tigers made just 5-of-19 from three-point range, including 0-3 in overtime.
Mizzou’s second-leading scorer, Aijha Blackwell, returned after a two-game absence following a citation for possession of marijuana. She did not enter the game until 2:43 remained in the second quarter and played just 11 minutes all day. She did not see the floor in the final seven minutes and 53 seconds.
“Really, it’s hard. You kind of feel like your hands are tied a little bit when somebody’s away from the team for seven days, two games and a handful of practices,” Pingeton said. “Just had to try to find a way to get through it without her.
“I don’t know if I think it’s really fair to the other players to change something after not being with a team for seven days. That’s a challenging call for a coach.”
Pingeton said she talked with Blackwell before the tournament and her star knew that her role would be reduced. That may have been further impacted when travel difficulties prevented the Tigers from practicing in Nashville prior to Thursday’s game. Blackwell scored five points and had eight rebounds in her 11 minutes.
The loss was Mizzou’s third to the Razorbacks this season and seventh in a row since then end of the 2019 season. It leaves them 18-12 overall and 7-10 in SEC games this season. ESPN.com's Bracketology had the Tigers as one of the last four teams in the NCAA Tournament prior to Thursday’s loss. Now they have to wait and see.
“We put ourself in this position to be on the bubble. If we get in, we get in,” Troup said. “I’m excited. I love this team. I think we could make a run in March Madness if we really wanted to so I’m excited to see where we fall.”
“I don’t think we’re a bubble team. I think we’re a team that has the ability and the talent to play in that NCAA Tournament,” Pingeton said. “It’s hard to have to sit and wait, but bottom line is, we can’t do anything about that. Resume’s been written.
“I think we deserve to be in the NCAA Tournament.”
But the Tigers have to wait until Sunday, March 13 to find out if the selection committee agrees.
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