March Madness: Missouri State women's basketball dismantles Oral Roberts in WBIT
By the looks of how hard Missouri State women's basketball played to open the Women's Basketball Invitation Tournament, you would have never guessed the Lady Bears were playing in a secondary tournament.
The Lady Bears played like a team motivated to make a deep March Madness run in their 107-76 WBIT first-round win over Oral Roberts at Great Southern Bank Arena on Thursday night.
The win advanced the three-seed Lady Bears to the second round, where they will play two-seed Minnesota on Sunday. The Lady Bears will host the Golden Gophers at 2 p.m., despite being the lower seed.
Missouri State women's basketball scored 53 points in first half
The Lady Bears scored 15 of the game's first 17 points, which saw Paige Rocca hit back-to-back 3's to cap off the run. They were in full control when hitting six 3's in the opening quarter with Kaemyn Bekemeier also hitting a pair.
Advertisement
Their feet never came off the gas, extending their lead to as many as 27 with a minute left in the half. MSU made eight 3's, with Lacy Stokes and Bekemeier each scoring 12 points. Eight different Lady Bears scored in the game's first 20 minutes as the team shot 46.5% from the field and held the Golden Eagles to 33.3%.
Missouri State Lady Bear Kaemyn Bekemeier shoots a three-pointer as the Lady Bears take on the Oral Roberts Golden Eagles in the WBIT at Great Southern Bank Arena on Thursday, March 20, 2025.
Missouri State women's basketball cruises to win
Not much changed in the second half. Six different Lady Bears finished the game with 10 or more points.
Stokes led the way with 20 points, 10 assists and seven rebounds. Sarah Linthacum also had a double-double with 15 points and 11 boards. Bekemeier scored 17 points with four 3's. Rocca made five 3's.
Advertisement
The game marked the first time the Lady Bears scored 100 or more points in the team's three seasons under Beth Cunningham. It was the team's first since scoring 100 against Lincoln in Dec. 2020. It's also the first time the Lady Bears have scored 100 or more against a Division I opponent since scoring 108 against Valparaiso in Jan. 2019, the program's final season under Kellie Harper.
WBIT second round game vs Minnesota up next
Not since the opening game of the Amaka Agugua-Hamilton era have the Lady Bears faced Minnesota. The Lady Bears beat then-No. 23 Minnesota to tip off a season that saw them win a Missouri Valley Conference championship and be nationally ranked for much of the season.
A lot has changed since then. Minnesota is now coached by Dawn Plitzuweit, who previously led South Dakota and West Virginia. Her Gophers finished the season 20-11 and with an 8-10 record in Big Ten play.
This article originally appeared on Springfield News-Leader: Missouri State women's basketball destroys Oral Roberts in WBIT
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Washington Post
an hour ago
- Washington Post
Higashioka has 5 RBIs, Carter and Langford each homer as Rangers beat Twins 16-4
MINNEAPOLIS — Kyle Higashioka had a season-high five RBIs, Evan Carter and Wyatt Langford hit home runs and the Texas Rangers beat the Minnesota Twins 16-4 on Tuesday night. Carter finished with three hits, three RBIs and scored four times for the Rangers, who had 17 hits. Jake Burger reached safely and advanced to second on a fielding error to lead off the fourth inning and scored on a double by Adolis García. Higashioka followed with a two-run single that gave Texas a 3-0 lead. The Rangers scored five runs with two outs in the fifth and Carter's two-run shot made it 10-3 in the sixth. Tyler Mahle (6-3) gave up four runs on 10 hits in 5 2/3 innings. Ty France and Royce Lewis hit back-to-back RBI singles in the fourth. Trevor Larnach hit a two-out double and Ryan Jeffers followed with an RBI single in the fifth and Matt Wallner hit a leadoff homer in the sixth. Langford's leadoff homer sparked a six-run eighth that made it 16-4. France has reached base safely in a career-high 21 consecutive games and is hitting .329 (26 for 79) with 15 RBIs during that span. The Rangers are 3-4 on their nine-game road trip but have lost 13 of 20 overall. Corey Seager led off the fifth with a walk and advanced to second on a single by Carter, who moved to second on a wild pitch by starter Simeon Woods Richardson (2-3). Josh Jung hit a two-run single and García doubled before Higashioka added a two-RBI double and scored on a single by Josh Smith. Texas has won three consecutive road games for the first time this season. Jack Leiter (4-2, 3.48 ERA) is scheduled to start Wednesday against Minnesota's David Festa (0-1, 5.40 ERA) in the second of a three-game series. ___ AP MLB:
New York Times
3 hours ago
- New York Times
Twins rotation suddenly looks wobbly after Simeon Woods Richardson shelled in loss to Rangers
MINNEAPOLIS — The surest sign a baseball game has gone off the rails is when a position player is forced to pitch. The second appearance of Jonah Bride's career, which resulted in a scoreless ninth inning, occurred Tuesday night in a contest started by Simeon Woods Richardson. Both of Bride's outings have taken place in the last week in blowout losses started by Woods Richardson and David Festa, two pitchers whom the Minnesota Twins are once again in a position to depend upon for valuable innings as they deal with key injuries in the starting rotation. Advertisement Similar to Festa's outing Thursday in Sacramento, Woods Richardson surrendered a bunch of hard-hit contact, and his defense did him no favors, either, as the Texas Rangers crushed the Twins 16-4 in front of 24,765 at Target Field on Tuesday night. Woods Richardson — who yielded nine hard-hit balls — lasted only 4 2/3 innings, allowing seven runs (six earned), seven hits and three walks. 'We didn't do ourselves any favors on a lot of fronts,' Twins manager Rocco Baldelli said. 'The game got away from us.' The Twins already found themselves in a difficult spot last week when they promoted Festa to replace Pablo López, who suffered a devastating Grade 2 teres major strain June 3, which could keep him sidelined for three months. Though he's extremely talented, Festa, who is set to start again Wednesday after allowing eight runs in his most recent outing, has pitched more than five innings only once in 18 career appearances. He's tasked with filling in for a frontline starter in López who produced a combined 7.8 wins above replacement, according to FanGraphs, and the eighth-most innings pitched in baseball (379 1/3) the last two seasons. Then Sunday, Matthews, who originally placed Woods Richardson in the rotation after he struggled earlier in the season, was placed on the 15-day injured list with a Grade 2 subscapularis strain in his right shoulder. Though team sources said the injury isn't nearly as serious as the one suffered by López, Matthews will be shut down from throwing and won't be re-evaluated for roughly two weeks. Both injuries are significant losses to a rotation that produced the fourth-most fWAR in the majors as of June 4. Tuesday, the Twins recalled Woods Richardson, who was one of their most consistent starting pitchers and the club's rookie of the year in 2024. Advertisement But Woods Richardson struggled to get ahead in the count against a Rangers offense that entered Tuesday with the third-fewest runs scored in baseball. He threw first-pitch strikes to only 13 of the 26 batters and worked in deep counts after throwing strikes on only 53 of 98 pitches. Throw in defensive misplays by Royce Lewis and Byron Buxton, and another hot shot that Carlos Correa couldn't handle, and you had all the makings of a long night. After Buxton's two-base error in the fourth inning and a walk of Evan Carter with no outs, Woods Richardson yielded three runs. The Twins scored twice in their half to make it a 3-2 game, but Woods Richardson couldn't take advantage. He issued a leadoff walk to Corey Seager in the fifth and uncorked a wild pitch in the middle of allowing three consecutive two-out hits as Texas broke it open. I don't wanna stop til the groove gets right! Royce kept it going — Minnesota Twins (@Twins) June 11, 2025 'I also didn't do my part as well,' Woods Richardson said. 'I didn't throw as many strikes, it didn't help (the defense). It was a combination of everything. There's gonna be days like that.' With 96 games left on the Twins' schedule, Baldelli indicated there would be similar days ahead when he must lean on his starting pitchers to work deep into outings. Tuesday, the Twins manager asked Woods Richardson, who recorded at least an out in the sixth inning 12 times in the first 36 games (35 starts and one bulk pitching appearance) of his career, to carry the load. The Twins were down only a run with reliever Justin Topa warming up when Woods Richardson yielded a two-out single to Carter in the fifth. Josh Jung followed with a two-run single before Adolis Garcia doubled to end Woods Richardson's night. Topa surrendered two hits as Texas jumped ahead 8-2. Advertisement 'I wanted to give (Woods Richardson) an opportunity to pitch through it,' Baldelli said. 'There's going to be times where we push our starters, all of them. There might be times where we have to go to our good bullpen and let them go out and help us win a game, too. You might go to them a tick earlier in some games. We're not even halfway through the season. We're not going to be going to the bullpen early in most games. … It's going to be baseball decisions at that point.' Though he originally felt his shoulder strain during a bullpen session in Tampa last month, Matthews decided to push through it. He pitched seven innings in Seattle on May 30 and earned a victory with five one-run innings in Sacramento on Wednesday. The team's minor-league pitcher of the year in 2024, Matthews hopes his shoulder will respond quickly. 'We're hoping the time on the IL is short-lived,' Matthews said. 'We're going to take a little bit of time off. There is not like an exact date or amount of days. It's just dependent on how I feel. If I feel better in the next couple of days, we'll start playing catch again.' Depending on how their young arms respond, the Twins might eventually have to make a trade for a veteran starting pitcher. But that isn't likely to happen any time soon as teams typically aren't open to making deals in early June, preferring to wait until closer to the trade deadline to increase the number of suitors pursuing their players and driving up the price. Even if a team was willing to trade a starting pitcher, there's no telling whether the front office of the Twins, who are up for sale, would have the ability to add salary. For now, the Twins will have to make the best of it and lean on what they have, a group they entered the season believing offered plenty of depth for situations like this one. 'It was a good time to stretch him a little bit and let him pitch,' Baldelli said. 'We haven't done that a ton with him, and I think it's something that is good. There's a lot of things to be taken from longer outings and pitching further in the game. With Sim, we're going to talk about working ahead of hitters, controlling the at-bats in that manner. The changeup is something we talked about before the game, too. That pitch was just OK for him. He probably needed a little bit more command-wise from that pitch. But there's ability in that pitch. It certainly can be a weapon for him.' Otherwise, there could be more work ahead for Bride.
Yahoo
3 hours ago
- Yahoo
Racquetball's U.S. Open coming to Springfield in 2026
SPRINGFIELD, Mo–A year from Tuesday, the best racquetball players in the world will be in Springfield for the U.S. Open. Executive Director Jeff Collins made the announcement. And he expects up to 500 racquetball players from around the world to gather in Springfield in June of 2026. Missouri State's racquetball courts at Plaster Stadium will host preliminary matches. And the championship matches will be in a special glass-encased court at the Expo Center. Grandstands will be built around the special court. Racquetball's U.S. Open has not been held since 2022. So it'll also be a reunion for top level players. 'It's always been that kind of pilgrimage for all the racquetball players that they want to go to the U.S. Open. They want to compete to be crowned U.S. Open champion for either their age bracket or their skill division. But it's also a chance for family to get back to together,' said USA Racquetball's Stewart Solomon. 'You know the name U.S. Open is so recognizable. And in racquetball, like other sports, the prize money is doubled, tripled quadrupled. Along with that it's doubled, tripled, quadrupled the points. And when all that stuff is added in there, it just matters more. And play gets more intense,' said former racquetball pro Cliff Swan. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
