BY MAKENNA ALLEN<\/p>\n
Bouncing back from their first conference loss last week, the Tiger women\u2019s basketball team maintained their first place MIAA ranking as they soundly defeated the Northwest Missouri State University Bearcats 91-63 on Saturday. The Tigers extended their home-game winning streak that spans the course of 19 games in Gross Memorial Coliseum. <\/span><\/p>\n This as not the Tigers\u2019 first victory over the Bearcats. \u00a0In fact, the team is 13-10 in the all-time series against the Bearcats and has won nine of the last ten games against NMSU. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Despite what the score might suggest, the first half of the game presented a challenge for the Tigers. \u00a0Though the team was efficient offensively throughout the first quarter, the Bearcats consistently trailed close behind thanks to their strength from three-point range.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cI don\u2019t think we understood quite how well they shot it. \u00a0We can prepare for that and we can warn them and do the scouting for it but we just gave them a little bit too much space in the first half,\u201d Head Coach Tony Hobson said. \u00a0\u201cThey penetrate well enough that we hopped off a little too far and they would kick it and have enough space to get a three off.\u201d <\/span><\/p>\n This strong Bearcat offense allowed the team to cling to the Tigers as they even took the lead for a portion of the first quarter. \u00a0However, the Tigers succeeded in pulling away just before the end of the period, 28-23. <\/span><\/p>\n Hobson credits a portion of this offensive success with junior forward Lanie Page who remained hot throughout the game. \u00a0However, he also feels that overall, the game was one of the team\u2019s best offensively.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cThat was about as good an execution as we\u2019ve had for some time,\u201d Hobson said. \u00a0\u201cWe were getting just about what we wanted every time.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n This momentum continued into the second half of the game and became increasingly more noticeable as a result of changes made defensively.<\/span><\/p>\n As the team surged into the second half, they blocked out any Bearcat points until just under three minutes remained in the third quarter. \u00a0Where the Tigers had led by just nine points entering halftime, the team quickly demolished the Bearcats with their defense during the second half of play.<\/span><\/p>\n This shift in defense was the result of Hobson\u2019s halftime message that was \u201call defense.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cDefensively, we just needed to have a little more pride in stopping your man,\u201d Hobson said. \u00a0\u201cIt takes half a step. Half a step is the difference between them making a three and not even taking the shot.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n Hobson also suggested that Page\u2019s strong game contributed to the monsoon of points rained upon the Bearcats. <\/span><\/p>\n \u201cShe\u2019s a weapon. \u00a0It\u2019s like you having a tank and everybody else having smaller artillery sometimes, unless the tank\u2019s broken down. \u00a0If she\u2019s playing her best like today, she\u2019s hard to stop just because she can pull up out of transition,\u201d Hobson said. \u00a0\u201cIt puts us in another gear because it takes the pressure off of everybody else and then all of the sudden, everybody else is getting easier shots, especially inside.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n Both Page and Hobson agreed that electric atmosphere from a large crowd decked in pink for breast cancer awareness drove the team towards success.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cIt was really fun. \u00a0I was smiling, yelling, having a lot of fun,\u201d Page said. \u00a0\u201cThe crowd loved it too. I think the crowd helped us get in that roll and get us going.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n The crowd of students was one of the largest that the women\u2019s team has seen this season.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cWhen you come in here on a Saturday afternoon with lots of other things to do and see the crowd we have, not at halftime, not at the end of the game, at the beginning of our game, it\u2019s the best crowd we\u2019ve had all year. \u00a0They get into it and our kids really appreciate that,\u201d Hobson said.<\/span><\/p>\n Hobson hopes that this momentum will carry the team through the rest of the season as the Tigers climb the rankings both within the conference and nationally. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cOur frame of mind is good. \u00a0We have a good long-term outlook. \u00a0This team has aspirations in mind,\u201d Hobson said. \u00a0\u201cI think when you have that, it\u2019s easier to make it through the dog days.\u201d <\/span><\/p>\n The \u201cdog days\u201d continue next Sat., Feb. 2 as the Tigers travel to Kearney to take on the 4-5 Nebraska-Kearney Lopers.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" BY MAKENNA ALLEN Bouncing back from their first conference loss last week, the Tiger women\u2019s basketball team maintained their first place MIAA ranking as they… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":142,"featured_media":43350,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"Tiger Women's Basketball demolishes NMSU in strong offensive showing","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[11,7349,3395],"tags":[69,604,3448,106,11616,12003,12489,103,290,182,11444],"class_list":["post-43351","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-sports","category-womens-basketball-sports","tag-fhsu","tag-fhsu-athletics","tag-fhsu-womens-basketball","tag-fort-hays-state-university","tag-lanie-page","tag-makenna-allen","tag-nmsu-bearcats","tag-tiger-media-network","tag-tmn","tag-tony-hobson","tag-womens-basktball"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/tigermedianet.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/01\/B95A8265.jpg?fit=4617%2C3078&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43351","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/142"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=43351"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43351\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":43353,"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43351\/revisions\/43353"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/43350"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=43351"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=43351"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=43351"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}