Ed Beach (Drury Sports Information) ROLLA, Mo. – The Drury Lady Panthers pulled away from a pesky Missouri S&T squad in the fourth quarter for an 80-58 win in Rolla on Thursday night.
Drury ends the regular season 25-3 and 17-1 in the Great Lakes Valley Conference. The win clinches the top seed in the GLVC tournament for the Lady Panthers. The Lady Miners, who were eliminated from GLVC tournament, ends their season with a 10-16 record and a 5-13 mark in the league.
The Lady Panthers, ranked 8th in NCAA-II, outscored Missouri S&T 24-9 in the fourth quarter to put the game away. After leading by as much as 15 in the first quarter, Drury had their lead cut to nine at halftime, 35-26, and Missouri S&T got within four points of the lead in the second half. Drury owned a 56-49 lead going into the final quarter before pulling away.
“Teams are tough to beat when they have nothing to lose and S&T played us tough tonight,” said Drury head coach Molly Miller. “Every time we tried to pulled away, they had an answer. I was really glad to see that we held them to single digits in the fourth quarter. That’s what we challenged our team to do in the fourth quarter and we needed to do to put the game away.”
Hailey Diestelkamp led all scorers with 19 points. The freshman from Owensville added six rebounds and four steals. Heather Harman had 18 points while Paige Wilson scored 11 of her 14 points in the fourth quarter.
Janie Arand led Missouri S&T with 15 points.
Drury earned a first round bye in the Great Lakes Valley Conference tournament and will not play again until March 3rd. Their quarterfinal game at the Ford Center in Evansville, Indiana will have a game time announced next week.
