Shooting Struggles and Turnovers Lead to @UNCBearsWBB Loss

Tuesday, December 8

Greeley, Colo.

7:00 pm

University of Northern Colorado

5-4

Colorado State

7-1

Colorado State

Northern Colorado

Photo by: Dean Popejoy

12/8/2015 10:18:00 PM | Women's Basketball

Box Score

Northern Colorado women's basketball struggled finding the basket and turned the ball over to often leading to a lose

By: Ryan Pfeifer, UNCBears.com

GREELEY, Colo. – Northern Colorado women's basketball struggled with shooting and turnovers Tuesday night, falling to Colorado State 62-46 inside Bank of Colorado Arena. UNC finished the night shooting 34.9 percent and committed 16 turnovers.

"The turnovers are five more than we have on a season average. I think the turnovers really affected us in the first half and didn't help us get into a groove on offense," head coach Kamie Ethridge said. "You can see that in the stats for the game when they got off 60 shots and we had only 43, the turnovers are a big factor in that."

While UNC struggled shooting, CSU shot well early in the game to take control of it and never looked back. The Rams started the game on a 9-2 run going 4-of-5 from the field during the opening minutes.

The good shooting for CSU continued through the quarter as the Rams led 19-11 after the first, finishing 56.3 percent from the field.

"We didn't handle the pressure very well and that didn't help us get into a groove on offense," Savannah Scott said.

In the second quarter, UNC really struggled to find the rim. The team ended up making only one basket, by Kourteney Zadina. With the tough times on offense, the majority of Northern Colorado's points, seven of the nine, came from the free throw line in the quarter.

By the time the horn sounded to end the half, CSU had built a 32-20 lead, while the Bears shot 26.3 percent from the field and committed 11 turnovers.

"They really got into us and made us play off the bounce," Ethridge said. "Nothing came easy on that end of the floor. They didn't allow us to move the ball well and we needed to get it going side-to-side."

The second half started out in similar fashion to the first, with CSU going on a 12-1 run to build its lead to 44-21.

At the 4:48 mark of the third quarter Zadina made the Bears first basket since 5:39 of the second quarter. That basket jump started a UNC run to close out the third and open the final quarter.

Including the made shot at 4:48 in the third quarter, Zadina made the next six buckets for Northern Colorado accumulating 13 of her team leading 17 points in the game. She shot 8-for-13 in the contest.

After the flurry from Zadina, the Bears had moved within 13 of the Rams, but back-to-back three's from CSU put an end to a comeback.

Savannah Scott attempted a mini run of her own, scoring five straight points to get the deficit down to 14 with 3:30 left, but that's as close as the team would get. Scott ended the game with 10 points and a team leading eight rebounds.

Northern Colorado's next opponent will be another tough one when they host No. 20/21 South Florida in a week. The Bears and Bulls will tip-off at 7:00 p.m.