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The University of Mississippi Athletics
Ole Miss
Missouri
Ole Miss Falls at Mizzou
2/15/2015 | Women's Basketball
COLUMBIA, Mo. -- Senior forward Tia Faleru (Ozark, Ala.) scored 18 points and added 15 rebounds for her 30th career double-double, but the Ole Miss women's basketball team couldn't overcome the hot shooting Missouri team in a 72-58 road loss at Mizzou Arena.
Joining Faleru in double figures was A'Queen Hayes (Horn Lake, Miss.) with a career-best 16 points, her first game in double figures since 12 points against Mississippi State. Ole Miss struggled from the floor in the contest shooting just 29.2 percent (21-of-72) for their second straight game shooting under 30 percent.
Trailing by 13 points at halftime, Ole Miss came out and went to work on the defensive end forcing the Tigers into a bit of foul trouble while capitalizing from the free throw line. Ole Miss scored its first seven points from the charity stripe and didn't nail its first field goal until the 14:53 mark.
Ole Miss got as close as 10 points but Missouri rattled off a 6-0 run to keep the Rebels at bay and extended its lead, one they didn't lose the rest of the contest. The Rebels made a run late, but couldn't mount a comeback in the final minutes dropping its seventh straight game.
Missouri opened the game with a 5-0 run including a layup just second into the game from Frericks forcing head coach Matt Insell to call a timeout. The Rebels responded with a bucket from Erika Sisk (Oxford, Miss.), but the home team extended its lead to 7-2 at the first media timeout. Ole Miss opened the game 1-of-6 and 0-1 from long range in the early going, but Ole Miss dug in on defense and started to have some success.
The Rebels trimmed the Missouri lead to 11-7, but the home team rattled off 10 unanswered points to extend its lead to 21-7 forcing Insell to take another timeout to try and regroup. With the Mizzou lead at 27-12, Faleru went to work on the glass hoping to spark her teammates. The Alabama native had 10 first half boards to lead all rebounders and was two points shy of a first half double-double.
Ole Miss trimmed a once 15-point Missouri lead to 10-points with a layup from Hayes at the 4:50 mark but a 9-0 run from the Tigers pushed the lead back to 15 with 2:36 left, but a jumper from Faleru gave the home team a 13-point, 38-25 lead at the break.
Ole Miss will stay on the road traveling to Auburn for a Thursday primetime contest against the Tigers. Ole Miss and Auburn will tipoff at 8 p.m. at Fox Sports Net from Auburn Arena.
REBEL SIDELINES: Today's matchup was one which pitted the top-2 rebounders in the SEC in Ole Miss' Tia Faleru (10.4 rpg) and Missouri's Jordan Frericks (9.9 rpg) ... Tia Faleru picked up her 30 th career double-double and moved into fifth place all-time at Ole Miss ... Hayes was in double figures for the seventh time this season ... Ole Miss has dropped its seventh straight game, the longest win streak since last season when they dropped nine straight ... Kiara Golden tallied her third career game of multiple three-point field goals.
