Missouri women's basketball team lets halftime lead slip away

COLUMBIA — After a solid first half, the Missouri women's basketball team got careless.

The Tigers (10-5) let turnovers get the best of them, turning a halftime lead into a 65-50 defeat Wednesday at Mizzou Arena.

“We turned the ball over way too much,” Missouri coach Cindy Stein said. “We’ve got to find better ways of scoring. I think Kansas State’s got a good defense. I don’t want to be critical of their defense, but I don’t think they were forcing the turnovers that were happening. We have to obviously get better in that aspect. I think our lack of offensive output definitely put a lot of pressure on our defense.”

Although Missouri committed 17 turnovers, it also struggled to defend Kansas State (10-6, 2-0), which shot 66.7 percent from the field in the second half and used the shot clock to keep the number of possessions the Tigers had to a minimum. Unfortunately for the Tigers, Kansas State was making just about every shot that it took at the 29-second mark.

Missouri junior guard RaeShara Brown, who scored nine points, said the Tigers struggled to defend the deeper shots that came late in the shot clock. The Wildcats were 10-for-16 from the 3-point line.

“We played defense for 29 seconds,” RaeShara Brown said. “Our closeouts had to be longer, and we weren’t getting our hands out there fast enough.”

HOOD RETURNS: Ziggy Hood  a former standout defensive lineman on the Missouri football team, was in attendance for Wednesday's game. Hood, who now plays for the Pittsburgh Steelers, is in Columbia to show Steelers’ teammate defensive lineman Steve McLendon around campus.

Hood said he wanted to come see the Tigers play because he knows some of the players.

“It’s a great place to come to, a basketball game to watch the girls,” Hood said. “I try to be a supporter since they came to all of our games when I played football.”

Said Brown: “We’re always glad to have people come back and support us."

The Steelers, who are the defending Super Bowl champions, came just short of making the playoffs this season. Hood said he doesn’t bother watching other teams and would much rather spend time visiting Columbia.

“I have no favorite,” Hood said. “If it’s not the Steelers, I’m not worried about it. If we aren’t going for the national championship, I hope everybody loses.”