by SPEARFISH, S.D.—The Black Hills State University women’s basketball team entered their final contest of the 2014-15 regular season against Chadron State College with heavy RMAC Tournament implications. BHSU had an outside shot of sneaking into fourth place, but a CSU-Pueblo 69-59 win over Metro State on Friday night drowned those hopes.
The Yellow Jackets sat alone in sixth place prior to their game against the Eagles at the Young Center Saturday evening. BHSU needed a victory against the Eagles and a Fort Lewis loss at Colorado Mesa in order to take command of fifth place.
BHSU took care of business with an 86-71 win over Chadron State College Saturday evening. Fort Lewis College fell to Colorado Mesa 66-52, which helped the Yellow Jackets secure fifth place. BHSU improves to 15-11, 13-9 RMAC while the Eagles fall to 8-18, 8-14 RMAC.
BHSU held leads of 3-0 and 5-2 over Chadron State College out of the gates on senior night. However, that’s all the momentum BHSU was able to muster, as the Eagles never surrendered the lead for the reminder of the first half.
Katie Simonton’s three-pointer at the 12:38 mark of the first half capped off a 9-0 run on behalf of the Eagles. BHSU cut it within two points on a Cassidy Kotelman jump shot to narrow the Eagle lead to 13-11, but momentum swung in the opposite direction.
Chadron State College responded with a 6-2 run that leaped them to a 19-11 lead at the 8:25 mark of the first half. That was the spark plug BHSU needed and Bailey Kusser lighted much of it.
She drained a pair of three-pointers and two jump shots that anchored a 21-13 BHSU run that propelled the score to 32-32 at halftime.
Chelsey Biegler (Cheyenne River Sioux) and Taylor Trohkimoinen each registered a layup to pace the Yellow Jackets out of the gates in the second half. Biegler added a free throw to give BHSU a 40-35 lead with 17:01 left in the second half. Beigler finished with 13 Points, 9 Rebounds and 5 Assists on the night.
The Eagles cut it within one point on layups from Ruby Luders and Stephanie Knowles to narrow the Yellow Jacket lead to 40-39 at the 16:19 mark of the second half.
This didn’t faze BHSU as another Kusser three-pointer put the icing on a 14-2 Yellow Jacket run that gave them a 54-41 lead with 11:25 remaining in the second half.
The Yellow Jackets’ momentum helped them build a larger lead as the game progressed. They eventually built a 17-point lead at the 3:26 mark of the second half, making the score 79-62.
Logan Cowan drained one-of-two threes in the final five minutes to help BHSU secure an 86-71 victory. Those were the first three-point field goal attempts of Cowan’s career.
Cassidy Kotelman drained a season-high 18 points to lead all BHSU scorers.
#5 BHSU will return to action on Tuesday, Mar. 3 when they travel to #4 CSU-Pueblo for an RMAC quarterfinal contest.
