CEDAR CITY, Utah– The Lady T-Birds’ late rally fell short in their 78-69 loss against NAU on Monday night in the America First Event Center.
“That last stretch where we made a push after being down 20, we had great intensity and they did a good job of executing coming out of the timeouts, but we needed that intensity for 30-35 minutes,” head coach Tracy Sanders said.
Becca sinks the three, bringing the TBirds within six pic.twitter.com/QP8iDq7npL
— SUU W. Basketball 🏀 (@SUUWBasketball) January 29, 2019
Rebecca Cardenas led SUU with 21 points, shooting 4-for-6 from three and 4-for-5 on free throws. Harley Hansen followed with 18 points and Peyton Shepherd finished with four made threes for a career-high 14 points.
Step-back three for Peyton pic.twitter.com/UY5nv2edl3
— SUU W. Basketball 🏀 (@SUUWBasketball) January 29, 2019
NAU outshot SUU 51% to 33% in the first half en route to a 39-29 lead at the break. NAU’s Peyton Carroll scored ten of her team leading 18 points in the half to help the Lumberjacks build their lead.
After trailing 63-43 with 7:48 left to play, SUU went on an 18-5 run to close the gap to 68-61 at the 0:55 mark. It was too little, too late though as NAU made their free throws down the stretch to hold off the T-Birds.
With the loss, the Lady T-Birds dropped to 5-13 overall and 2-7 in the Big Sky.
SUU returns home on Thursday, Jan. 31 to face Eastern Washington. The game will be streamed on Pluto TV Channel 236.
Story by: Aaron Peterson for SUU News
aapete3232@gmail.com
Photo courtesy of SUU Athletics Strategic Communication
