Women's Rally Falls Short

February 4, 2009

COMMERCE, Texas - The Southwestern Oklahoma State University women's basketball team dusted itself off from a slow first half start and staged a dramatic charge only to see it fall just short in a 70-65 loss to Texas A&M-Commerce on Wednesday.

Erin Wright scored a season-best 21 points, including 16 in a second half as the Bulldogs charged back from a 20-point deficit. SWOSU fashioned together a 24-7 run over an eight-minute span and got within three points. SWOSU's Shanessa Smith scored with 8:59 to play and the Lions' lead was 53-50.

Commerce, which was led by Brittany Jordan with 32 points, managed to regroup and hold the Bulldogs from that point. Jordan's basket gave the Lions a 58-50 lead with 7:58 to play and the Bulldogs never got closer than four points from that point.

The loss dropped SWOSU to 7-13 overall and 3-4 in the Lone Star Conference North Division. The Bulldogs, who are currently in fifth place in the division, were hoping to gain ground on the fourth-place Lions, who improve to 13-7 and 5-2 with the win. The top four teams in each of the LSC's North and South Divisions qualify for the conference post-season tournament.

SWOSU also got double-figure scoring efforts from Jenna Sprague with 11 points and Smith with 10. The Bulldogs finished the game making 41% of their shots connecting on 24-of-58 attempts. SWOSU made just 27% in the first half and showed considerable improvement in the second half making better than 53%.

The Bulldogs out rebounded Commerce by a 46-41 margin with Weatherford's Courtney Harper leading the Bulldogs with eight boards.

The same two teams will meet again Saturday in Weatherford with tipoff set for 2 p.m.