Shooting Woes Cause Missouri Women's Basketball to Fall to Kansas State
Missouri women's basketball faced its toughest opponent thus far this season in No. 13 Kansas State on Saturday and would fail to keep up with the Wildcats, suffering an 84-56 loss.
The Tigers only trailed by seven at the end of the first half and even led at the end of the first quarter. But the Tigers would quickly crumble in the third quarter, where they were outscored 36-12. The Wildcats' scoring run was fueled by center Ayoka Lee. Missouri's defense had very few answers for the 6-foot-6 senior who led the Wildcats with 28 points.
"She's just a glue player for them," Missouri head coach Robin Pingeton said of Lee. "She plays at her pace ... She's an elite level player. They do a great job utilizing her."
Offensively for Missouri, there seemed to be a lid hovering over the basket through all four quarters. The Tigers had their worst shooting performance of the season, going 18-62 from the field. Missouri's leading scorers in the underwhelming day on the scoreboard were graduate guards Hayley Frank and Abby Feit, who both had 13 points on the night.
Feit, a transfer from Evansville, was inserted into the Missouri's starting five for the first time. Feit was replacing U-Mass transfer Angelique Ngalakulondi, who suffered an arm injury against Virginia on November 30th. In addition to the 13 points, Feit's physicality on defense was noticeable as she brought down eight total rebounds.
"She had some good stretches," Pingeton said of Feit's performance. "She's a veteran. She has a ton of experience under her belt and I thought she responded really well."
Though Pingeton acknowledged that Saturday's loss will sting, she has plenty of optimism that her team will be able to recover and improve.
"I think it's as much mental as it is physical," Pingeton said. "Are there things we need to work on physically? Absolutely. But we will break down film and will continue to learn and grow and if we're learning, we're getting better. That's the most important thing to me."
Missouri will round out their non-conference schedule with games against Illinois next Sunday and against Kansas City on Thursday, December 21st. The Tigers will begin conference play on January 4th when they travel to play No. 4 LSU.
