WEATHERFORD, Okla. – No. 25 Southwestern Oklahoma State used a strong second half to defeat Oklahoma Baptist 85-64 on Saturday afternoon at Pioneer Cellular Event Center.
The Lady Bulldogs halted OBU's four-game winning streak and moved to 8-2 and 2-0 in the Great American Conference. For the Bison, they dropped to 4-3 and 1-1 in league play.
Turnovers were a major factor on Saturday as SWOSU committed just seven, while the Bison notched 27, a season-high. SWOSU converted those miscues into 38 points.
Before the second half, an improved green and gold squad played the perennial GAC contender well.
In the first, the Bison hit 56 percent from the field and 3-of-5 from downtown to attain a 21-16 lead. With just under three minutes left, forward
Jill Leslie sank a long shot to push OBU ahead 14-12. That sparked a 10-4 run for the visitors as
Jaylin Stapleton,
Mallory Lockhart and
Kalifa Ford added a few more makes for OBU.
Second-quarter action was back and forth until the Lady Bulldogs used a small, late-surge to take a halftime lead. In fact, there were five ties and five lead changes in the second stanza.
Ford's layup at 3:58 gave the Bison a 34-31 lead but SWOSU followed with an 11-2 run. That stretch saw Macy Gore hit two 3-pointers and a free throw to lead the hosts. By the break, Southwestern led 42-36.
After intermission, the Lady Bulldogs pulled away within the first 4:30 minutes of the third. In those early minutes, the Bison were 3-of-9 from the field while SWOSU hit half of its 10 attempts which included a pair of three-balls. The last of those, from Bethany Franks at 5:31, pushed the host's advantage to 55-45.
Oklahoma Baptist would not recover after that as the Lady Bulldogs continued to pull away.
By game's end, Ford had scored a team-high 18 points while Lockhart chipped in with nine on a trio of three-pointers. Additionally, Stapleton contributed eight and Melissa Southard came off the bench to score a half-dozen points.
Next on the schedule for OBU is a non-conference road date at Oklahoma Christian on Dec. 7 at 5:30 p.m.
