Jan. 31, 2004
COLUMBIA, Mo. - Despite having four players score in double figures, the Missouri women's basketball team dropped a 68-66 decision to No. 11/10 Colorado Saturday afternoon at the Hearnes Center.
Senior All-America candidate Evan Unrau (Fort Collins, Colo. / Rocky Mountain HS) hit both ends of the free-throw double-bonus to tie the score at 66 with 19.7 seconds on the clock. CU used its final timeout with 11.7 left, and set up a pass down low for Bjorklund, who was fouled by sophomore forward Christelle N'Garsanet with 4.7 seconds left. Bjorklund hit both free throws to go up 68-66. Unrau's last-second 3-point attempt fell short as time expired.
Bjorklund's 19 points led all scorers, while senior forward Stretch James (Columbus, Ohio / Tyler [Texas] JC) led Mizzou in scoring for the second consecutive game with 16 points. Senior guard Tracy Lozier (Leawood, Kan. / Blue Valley North HS) tallied 15 points to go along with her seven assists. Unrau had 13 points, a career-high seven assists and five rebounds, and Senior guard MyEsha Perkins (Detroit, Mich. / Oak Park HS / Trinity Valley JC) added 12 points.
The Tigers twice built up seven-point leads (at 15-8 and 19-12) in the first 10 minutes of the first half on the strength of solid 9-of-12 shooting. Colorado then went on a 14-2 run to take a 26-21 lead with 7:03 to go. It was capped by a 3-pointer by Emily Waner.
Yet Lozier cut that streak with a 3-pointer of her own, and started the Tigers on a 10-4 run to retake a 31-30 lead with 2:58 to go in the half. Perkins had five points in the final 2:10 to give the Tigers a 36-34 lead heading into the break. Lozier had 10 first-half points to go with four assists. CU center Tera Bjorklund had 12 points in the opening stanza.
The second half was a see-saw battle, with neither team opening a lead bigger than six points at any time. With just over 11 minutes remaining, James ran off a string of eight straight Missouri points, to bring the Tigers within one, 52-51.
Lozier gave the Tigers a 56-54 lead when she canned her third 3-pointer of the game with 7:07 left in the game. It was Mizzou's first lead since the 18:47 mark. Yet the Buffs countered with a 10-2 run started on a pair of Randy Wirt free throws that gave CU a 64-58 lead with 3:43 to go.
Mizzou countered with a 6-2 run of its own to pull within 2 of the Buffs at 66-64. Wirt fouled out with 19.7 seconds left to put Unrau on the line to set up the game's final moments.
"My hat's off to Colorado," Head Coach Cindy Stein said. "Good teams will make you play bad, and we had some uncharacteristic errors tonight. Good teams will do that to you. I thought our kids played really hard, and they played with a lot of heart, but we needed to do some things to win the game that didn't take place."
The women travel Tuesday for their first of two road games next week to face current No. 3/4 Texas at 7 p.m. Mizzou's next home game is a week from Wednesday vs. current No. 16/19 Baylor. For ticket information, call 1-800-CAT-PAWS (573-884-PAWS in Mid-Missouri). As a reminder, holders of the student All-Sports Pass or the KMIZ-ZOU Spirit Pass gain free admission to all women's basketball games.