BOX SCORE
BRIDGEPORT, Conn. ? The No. 12 seeded Lady Mocs fell 69-59 to fifth-seeded Kansas State in the opening round of the women's NCAA Basketball Tournament Sunday at the Arena at Harbor Yard, ending the nation's longest winning streak at 24.
Chattanooga closes out its season at 29-3 while the Wildcats will advance to the second round to take on #4 Louisville for a chance to advance to the Sweet 16 in New Orleans next weekend. The 29 wins equals the most wins in school history for the Lady Mocs.
Laura Hall led the Lady Mocs with a 19-point effort, scoring 17 of those in the second half, to lead three Chattanooga players in double figures. Brooke Hand went 5-for-13 from the 3-point line for 15 points in the game and Shanara Hollinquest, who started the game with the Lady Mocs' first seven points, had 12.
Hall nailed a trio of 3-pointers and was 2-for-2 from the free throw line while Hand hit an NCAA tournament personal-best five long range bombs. She improved her SoCon leading 3-point total to 315 for her career.
Kansas State jumped out to a 5-0 lead to start the game before Hollinquest hit the first of her three field goals. She would put Chattanooga on top at the 16:22 mark with a lone 6-0 run. The Wildcats pushed the lead up to as much as three as neither team could find the mark for more than four minutes in the opening half.
Anderson was fouled as she hit a layup to tie the game at 9-9 with 10:27 to play in the half and nailed her free throw to put Chattanooga up for the second time at 10-9. Kansas State again ran the score up to a six point lead at 16-10, but a trio of 3-pointers from Hall and Hand quickly gave UTC the advantage. Hand drained her third consecutive trey to give the Lady Mocs their largest lead of the half at 22-18 with 6:24 to go.
However, UTC would score just two points to the Wildcats seven the remainder of the half and Kansas State carried a slender 25-24 lead into the half. Chattanooga went just 8-of-26 (30.8%) in the half with four 3-pointers and was 4-for-5 from the charity stripe. KSU shot just a little better at 33.3 percent (9-of-27) with three 3-pointers.
In the second half Chattanooga got off to a hot start and quickly built up a seven point lead, its largest, at 36-29 with 16:31 to go in the game with Hand hitting a pair of 3-pointers and Anderson getting into the action with four points off one layup and a pair of free throws.
Kansas State pounded back and knotted the game twice before getting the lead for good at 40-39 with 13:44 to play on a pair of free tosses from Kelsey Nelson who had a game-high 20 points.
The Lady Mocs would draw as close as one point three more times in the game with the latest being 60-59 with 1:21 to play, but a flurry of free throws at the end pushed the lead to its largest with Kansas State coming away with the first round win.
Chattanooga shot much better in the second half making 12-of-30 attempts (40.0%), but the Wildcats hits 52 percent of their shots making 13-of-25 from the floor and were a perfect 17-of-17 from the free throw line.
Anderson had four assists, nine points and nine rebounds for the Lady Mocs, just missing her 12th double-double of the season. Hollinquest had five boards while Hand pulled down four. Erin Ogan grabbed five rebounds for the Lady Mocs and dished out three assists. UTC was 11-of-13 from the free throw line and 8-of-21 from the beyond the 3-point arc.
Four Wildcats were in double figures led by Nelson's 20. Marlies Gipson and Shalee Lehning each had 12 while Kari Kincaid has 10. Lehning had a team-high eight boards and seven assists, while Nelson and Shana Wheeler each has six rebounds.
The Lady Mocs will graduate five seniors in Alex Anderson, Laura Hall, Brooke Hand, Amy Mohr and Kristen Spann. This quintet accounted for 4,500 of Chattanooga points, more than 50 percent, over the last four years and led the Lady Mocs to four Southern Conference titles and three NCAA tournaments.
Anderson completes her career with 1,732 points, fifth all-time and 1,010 career rebounds, second all-time and only the second player in Lady Mocs history to grab over 1,00 rebounds. She is the all-time shot blocking leader with 221 blocks. She and Hand have played in127 games for the Lady Mocs, the most by any Chattanooga player all-time.
Hand leaves with the Southern Conference record for 3-pointers with 315 over her career. She also holds the single-season mark with 90 in her junior year and has a SoCon tournament record 12 last year.
Hall closes her remarkable career with 121 starts in 123 games. She just missed 1,000 points with 972 and is ranked among the school's top 10 for 3-pointers (145) and assists (429).
