Missouri State nearly completed its second consecutive miraculous comeback Friday evening, but Southern Illinois closed the game on a 13-4 run to earn a 69-61 win over the Lady Bears at SIU Arena.
The loss leaves MSU (17-9, 10-4 Missouri Valley Conference) in a three-way for second in the loss column with four games to play, while SIU improved to 16-9 and 9-4 in league play. The defeat also ended Missouri State’s streaks of 17 consecutive wins against Illinois schools and nine straight victories in the state of Illinois.
The first half included five ties and 10 lead changes and resulted in a 28-all score at the break after the Salukis overcame a 24-16 deficit early in the second quarter.
The Salukis got off to a hot start in the second half, making four of their first shots to lead 37-30 with 6:42 left in the third quarter. The Lady Bears got no closer than four points for the remainder of the period, as SIU shot 10-for-16 compared the 4-for-16 for MSU, finishing with a conventional 3-point play with 4.0 seconds left to lead 51-43.
SIU scored 19 seconds into the fourth period to push its lead to 10 points, and Liza Fruendt scored twice in a 5-0 run to pull MSU back to 53-48 with 6:57 left.
Southern Illinois countered with a 3-pointer to lead 56-48 before Tyonna Snow scored seven points during a 9-0 run that put the score back in MSU’s favor at 57-56 with 3:32 remaining.
The Lady Bears were poised to finish off another double-digit comeback victory at that point, but the Salukis drained their next four field goals to grab a 65-59 lead with 1:32 to play, and were able to hold on despite missing six free throws in the final 37 seconds.
Snow and Fruendt led MSU with 14 points each and Kenzie Williams added 13. Snow had six steals and passed Lisa Davies for the No. 11 spot on Missouri State’s career scoring list. Williams had four steals to join MSU’s career top 10 as the Lady Bears matched a season high with 15 thefts and scored 30 points off 22 SIU turnovers.
Rishonda Napier (23) and Kylie Giebelhausen (18) led an SIU offense that shot 48.1 percent compared to 35.4 percent for the Lady Bears. The Salukis also held a 39-36 edge on the glass.
MSU plays its final regular-season road game Sunday at 1 p.m. at Evansville (2-21, 1-11).
