No. 25 Hillcats Fall to Lady Cavaliers at SAC Tournament, 58-50
Logan Froese led the Cats with 18 points. (Photo by Ryan Weaver)SILOAM
SPRINGS, Ark. – No. 5 seeded St. Gregory’s led from the
opening tip to the final whistle over the fourth seeded Rogers State women’s
basketball team as the Lady Cavaliers upset the Hillcats 58-50 in the opening
round of the Meisner Aircraft Sooner Athletic Conference tournament on Thursday
morning at Bill George Arena on the campus of John Brown University.
The Hillcats couldn’t stop SGU guard Laticia Silva who
scored almost half of the Cavs total points. The Whitesboro, Texas native
poured in 27 points for SGU while adding seven rebounds.
SGU opened
the contest with back-to-back buckets and RSU played catch-up the rest of the
way. RSU held the deficit to single digits throughout the first frame and cut
the SGU lead to two points twice but the Lady Cavs refused to relinquish the
lead. With five minutes to play in the first half Logan Froese sliced the discrepancy
to two with a layup but SGU answered with consecutive buckets to push the lead
out to seven points. Sasha Barnes hit a half court shout at the buzzer that
went off the backboard and hit the front of the rim as the Hillcats trailed
22-16 at the break. RSU shot just 20 percent from the field in the first
stanza.
RSU opened the second half with a put back by Froese
but the Lady Cavs answered with a 6-1 run to take a nine point lead. Ariani
Silva drained a three pointer from the corner and Rician Walker tied the game
with a layup off a turnover to tie the game 31-31 with 12 minutes to play. SGU
followed with a 5-0 run and held off the Hillcats the rest of the way.
Claremore, Okla. native Logan Froese was the lone
Cat to reach double digit scoring as she matched her season-high with 18 points
while adding three steals. It was the 15th time this season the
junior has tallied double digit scoring.
Rogers State (20-11) will await its fate as the
Hillcats are still in contention for an at-large berth to the NAIA Tournament in
Frankfort, Ky. March 14-20.
