Lady Tigers drop regular-season finale, will host a playoff game on Saturday

Finishing the regular season by playing at Butler Community College on Wednesday, the Cowley College women's basketball team fell behind early and was never a threat in the 62-50 road defeat.

After defeating Butler 71-69 on January 21 in Arkansas City, Cowley never led in Wednesday's contest as they had its four-game winning streak come to an end. The Lady Tigers (16-14) finished in a three-way tie for eighth place in the conference with a record of 10-14 and earned the eighth seed and a home game to open the region playoffs.

On Wednesday, Butler was led by sophomore post-player Freddie Wallace, who scored 18 points and became the school's all-time scoring leader with 1,095 career points. The Grizzlies (23-7) earned the third seed in the region tournament by finishing with a conference record of 17-7.

Cowley got off to a slow start, shooting 2-of-14 from the floor, and trailed 11-4 after one-quarter of play. The Lady Tigers would trail by as many as 17 points (26-9) before closing the first half on a 7-0 run to close within 26-16.

A pair of free throws by freshman Destiny Yates cut Butler's lead to 26-18; however, Butler would push its lead back to 17 (50-33) before Yates buried a three-pointer just before the buzzer to pull Cowley within 50-36.

The Grizzlies would score the first six points of the fourth quarter and coasted to the 12-point win.

"We just could not handle Butler's physical play," Cowley head coach Todd Clark said. "They kind of bullied us into some mistakes."

Cowley sophomore Ndack Mbengue continued her solid play by finishing with 19 points and nine rebounds, while fellow sophomore Anna Przyszlak added 14 points and 13 rebounds. However, Cowley's other three starters combined to make only 2-of-28 shots from the floor.

"We did not do a good enough job of getting Ndack and Anna enough touches," Clark said.

The Lady Tigers will now prepare to host No. 9-seed Cloud County (14-15) Saturday at 1 p.m. in the first round of the Region VI Tournament. The T-Birds split the season series against Cowley and are coming off a 117-72 win at Northwest Kansas Tech in their regular season finale.

"We are excited to have a home playoff game and hope to play well on Saturday," Clark said.

The winner of Saturday's game will advance to play at top-seeded Hutchinson on Tuesday at 5:30 p.m.

Box score:

Cowley (50): Destiny Yates 1-7 2-2 5, Ndack Mbengue 8-12 3-3 19, Anna Przyszlak 4-12 5-6 14, Hattie Pyle 1-12 7-10 9, Jaiden Smith 0-9 0-0 0, Josephine Vourliotis 1-2 0-0 3, Georgia Knight 0-2 0-0 0. Totals: 15-56 17-21 50.

Butler (62): J'unti Franklin 6-13 2-2 17, Freddie Wallace 7-17 4-6 18, Randi Harding 1-11 2-2 4, Maycee James 2-11 0-0 4, Dayuna Colvin 1-5 2-3 4, Jada Hopson 1-3 1-2 3, Anna Eldridge 0-3 0-0 0, Brittanie Brickhouse 2-2 1-2 5, Alba Cunill 1-3 0-0 3, Tiana Winn 2-4 0-0 4. Totals: 23-72 12-17 62.

Three-pointers: Cowley 3-21 (Yates 1-4, Przyszlak 1-2, Vourliotis 1-2, Smith 0-8, Pyle 0-4, Knight 0-1), Butler 4-22 (Franklin 3-6, Cunill 1-3, Harding 0-4, Colvin 0-3, Wallace 0-2, James 0-2, Eldridge 0-2). Rebounds: Cowley 42 (Przyszlak 13), Butler 51 (Wallace 9). Assists: Cowley 11 (Yates, Smith 3), Butler 18 (three players with 4). Turnovers: Cowley 24, Butler 21. Total fouls: Cowley 17, Butler 18. Fouled out: Pyle. Technicals: none.