Tigers struggle offensively, fall to UCM in MIAA semifinals

KANSAS CITY, Mo. – For as good as the Tigers played defense and as poorly as they shot, the halftime deficit wasn’t anything too serious to overcome.

But when the offensive struggles continued in the third quarter, Central Missouri began to distance itself from the Fort Hays State University women’s basketball team and then held on to win 59-48 on Saturday afternoon in the MIAA tournament semifinals.

“It was a hard-fought game,” said FHSU coach Tony Hobson. “Defensively in the first half, I thought we were about as good as we could be. We forced 15 turnovers and held them to 21 points. It was we just got some good looks early, a lot of open 3 looks, and we couldn’t get anything to drop. We got in an early hole. It was a hard-fought game. I knew it would be.”

The Jennies, the regular-season MIAA champs and tourney’s No. 1 seed, eventually scored the game’s first points and led the entire way.

But the Tiger defense kept them in it as FHSU trailed 16-9 after the first quarter and 21-17 at the break.

“Their defense, they’re just hard to play against,” said FHSU’s Belle Barbieri, who had eight points and 12 rebounds. “They are just as athletic as us. It’s almost like they know your next move. Their hands are always on the ball. They move well to the post. It just makes it tough to get shots up. Obviously, it wasn’t falling like maybe it was (Friday), so you just have to play through it and keep going.”

Fort Hays (23-7) shot just 26% from the floor in the first 20 minutes and had 10 turnovers. But Central Missouri (26-4) wasn’t much better, making only 32% of its shots while being forced into 15 turnovers.

“That was about a great of a defensive game as I’ve seen in a long time,” said UCM coach Dave Slifer. “They are always hard to score against, but I thought our defense was outstanding throughout the whole evening. It made for an ugly game; the second quarter was not pretty basketball. We understand that, but we grounded it out and still had a four-point lead at halftime.”

The Jennies stretched the lead to 16 points in the third quarter, as FHSU began to search for answers. A day earlier in a win against Pitt State, the Tigers used a solid run in the third and fourth quarters to win in quarterfinal action.

“As the game wore on, I thought we had a little fatigue issue and shots got hard to get,” Hobson said. “The start of the third quarter really hurt us. We made a really good run at them and cut it to six and had the ball. If we could have held that lead of theirs to maybe 10 or eight instead of 14, 16 points, then when you make your run you have a two-point game. It got away from us right there. I thought our kids showed a lot of heart by coming back, but they made some big shots when they needed to and got a couple key offensive rebounds. They showed why they won the conference. They’re a tough team to handle, and they got us today.”

Fort Hays trimmed the 16-point lead down to 41-30 at the end of the third quarter, but UCM pushed the lead back to 13 after a basket by Nija Collier with 6:31 remaining.

Collier finished with 15 points and six rebounds for the Jennies.

“I think our post players did the best they possibly could,” said FHSU’s Jaden Hobbs, who led the Tigers with 16 points and three assists. “Our post players battling her, she’s really athletic and a really good rebounder. She showed by she made the all-conference team. The physicality did take a toll on us a little bit, but hopefully that will just prepare us for later on.”

Hobbs scored nine of her points in the final period, and had a key assist to Madison Mittie on a 3-pointer with 3:03 to play. That cut the margin to 49-42 and was the closest the Tigers had been in some time.

But UCM’s Morgan Fleming hit a step-back 3-pointer from the top of the key to answer.

The Tigers tried to make one last push, cutting the lead to 54-48 after a trey by Hobbs with 1:09 to play.

But once again the Jennies found an answer, this time from MIAA player of the year Megan Skaggs. She hit a 3 pointer as the shot clock ran down, pushing the advantage to 57-48 with just 31 seconds remaining.

“It just kind of shows why she’s player of the year,” Hobbs said about Skaggs, who finished with just seven points. “We did a good job on her defensively throughout the game, but she just showed us why she was player of the year. It was a tough shot.”

“She hit one and Fleming hit one,” Hobson said. “Taylor (Rolfs) played pretty good defense on her and had a good hand up. She’s a 26% 3-point shooter on the year, but I think with important shots, she seems to make a much higher percentage than that. She sure shot a much higher percentage on those shots against us this year.”

Central Missouri would hit free throws the rest of the way to win for the second time this year against FHSU. It was the Jennies’ eighth win in a row and 23^rd in their last 24 games.

Fleming finished with 20 points for UCM and pulled down seven rebounds.

UCM shot 43% for the game, while FHSU struggled with only 32% shooting.

The 17 points at halftime were the fewest the Tigers have scored in any game this year. The previous low was 23 against Missouri Western.

Central Missouri, ranked No. 15 in the nation, advanced to the finale Sunday. A year ago, FHSU beat UCM in the title game.

The Jennies were ranked No. 1 in the regional poll entering the week, while FHSU was sixth. The top eight teams make the NCAA DII postseason regional next weekend.

Teams that make the postseason will be revealed Sunday.

“We’re planning on playing again, and that’s how we’re approaching it,” Hobson said. “That’s not 100% sure, but I think we have a really good shot to get in the tournament. We’re approaching it like we’re going to make it. Until they tell us otherwise, we’re playing basketball. It wasn’t about the seniors and it’s been nice knowing you or anything. I think with the win (Friday) it solidified it a little bit, but anything can happen. We don’t know who’s going to win one of the other conference tournaments. You just never know the goofy way Division II runs their playoffs. It’s the strangest thing I’ve ever seen. You just don’t know what’s going to happen. We’ll just wait and see and find out tomorrow night.”

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