Southern Miss Loses To Tulane, 70-55
2/16/2002 12:00:00 AM | Women's Basketball
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Southern Miss Loses To Tulane, 70-55
Southern Miss lost for only the third time at home this season, losing to Tulane, 70-55, Saturday night. The loss dropped Southern Miss to 10-15 and 3-9, while Tulane improved to 18-9, 6-6.
Tierra Lassiter came off the bench to led Southern Miss with a career-high 21 points and Victoria Mason posted her third double-double of the season with 12 points and 11 rebounds. Tulane's Sarah Goree led all the Green Wave with a season-high 20 points and Kelly Nadeau chipped in 12 points.
"I thought we got good play from our inside players tonight," Head Coach Rick Reeves said. "I thought our guards let us down tonight. I was disappointed in their play. We made the Tulane defense look really good. We knew exactly what they were going to do and we didn't execute our game plan."
Southern Miss took scored the first two points of the game before Tulane went on an 8-0 run to take the lead 8-2. The Green Wave never trailed again. Tulane built as much as a 10-point lead, 25-14 with just under seven minutes remaining before the half. The Golden Eagles used a 12-5 run to cut the lead to four, 30-26 with 1:52 remaining in the half. Tulane finished the half with a 5-2 to run to take a 35-28 lead into the half.
"This was a big game for us," Reeves said. "I think we put our backs to the wall. I think we have to win one, maybe two games to get into the tournament and get some help from some other teams. I didn't want to be in that situation, but we are."
Tulane started the second half with a 7-3 run to push their lead to 11, 42-31, with 16:58 remaining. The Golden Eagles then cut the lead to seven, 43-36, before Tulane used a 14-0 run to take their largest lead of the game, 57-36. During that six-minute stretch, Southern Miss was 0-10 from the field.
"I thought Tulane played very well," Reeves said. "They really hit the offensive boards hard. They finished the game with 27 offensive rebounds. Their guards hurt us with their offensive rebounding."
Southern Miss finished the game shooting a dismal 29.5 percent from the field on 18-of-61 and pulled down 42 rebounds. Tulane shot 32.9 percent but outrebounded the Golden Eagles by 10, 52-42.
Southern Miss concludes its regular season, playing its final two C-USA games at home against East Carolina, Feb. 22 and Charlotte, Feb. 24.