             |
What
the Lakers did earn was a victory as Clayton State edged a dangerous
Texas A&M-Commerce squad 60-55 in the national quarterfinals at
Nebraska-Kearney’s Health and Sports Center. Clayton State
improves to 29-5 overall and advances to the NCAA Division II
“Final Four” on Thursday. The
Lakers will face unbeaten Florida Gulf Coast (33-0)
in the semifinals on Thursday night at 10:30 p.m. “Our
team right now feels a tremendous amount of relief that we were able
to win that game, because to a person we all admit that we played
nervously,” said Clayton State head coach Dennis Cox. “We
didn’t feel like ourselves tonight.” That
was evident in the first half when the Lakers appeared to be playing
on thick nerves. Despite shooting 48 percent from the field, Clayton
State committed 13 turnovers and saw a nine-point lead disappear.
Trailing 24-15, the Lions ran off an 11-2 run and tied the game
26-26 on a jump shot by Britney Jordan. However,
Clayton State took a one-point lead in at halftime thanks to a
3-point basket by Alecia Humphrey with 2:36 remaining. The
Lakers trailed by as much as five points early in the second half
before the hot shooting of Nikkisha Pritchett brought Clayton State
back into the game. Her 3-point basket at the 15:06 mark tied the
game at 36-36, and then Pritchett came up with a huge lay-up in
transition to trim the Texas A&M-Commerce lead to 47-45 with
9:55 remaining. The
lead changed hands four times before Crystal Brown put Clayton State
ahead for good 52-51 with a jump shot at the 5:04 mark. However,
perhaps the biggest basket of the game came with 2:37 remaining as
Brown drove baseline and converted a lay-up in traffic to give the
Lakers a 54-51 lead. “We
all stepped up and made some big plays in the second half,” Cox
said. “Nikkisha knocked down a three and I think that calmed us
down a little.” Over
the last nine minutes of the game, Clayton State limited Texas
A&M-Commerce to one field goal, which came with 18 seconds
remaining. Brown
paced Clayton State with 15 points, while Pritchett scored 12 points
off the bench. In addition, center Lynette Jackson scored 10 points,
grabbed eight rebounds and had four blocked shots off the bench. The
Laker bench out-scored Texas A&M-Commerce 29-5. |
determined by style points, and the Clayton State Laker women’s
basketball team didn’t earn too many style points in their NCAA
Division II “Elite Eight” showdown on Wednesday.