JACKSONVILLE, Alabama – The Lipscomb women’s basketball team lost their ASUN opener to the Jacksonville State Gamecocks 80-70 Wednesday night at Pete Mathews Coliseum.
Despite a high-octane performance on both sides of the ball by second-year freshman Jordan Peete, the Bisons came up short after the Gamecocks scored 49 points in the second half.
Peete led the Bisons offensively with 23 points on 10-15 shooting, including 3-6 on 3-pointers. The St. Louis native also collected two rebounds, an assist, a steal, and multiple tipped balls while committing just one turnover.
“I felt good,” Peete said. “I felt like I had the energy and I wanted everybody to feed off [of it], so I kept going.”
“We’ve been out for a minute,” Peete said, “so we were a little winded, but I think we were together. We wanted this win–we wanted it as a whole, so I think that we fed off each other’s energy.”
Bolstering the Bisons was the addition of sophomore guard Jalyn Holcomb to the lineup after an injury in November forced her to miss 9 games. Holcomb put up 23 minutes in her first game back and shot 4-8 from the floor to produce 9 points for the Bisons.
Sophomore guard Blythe Pearson entered the game with the joint-leading 3-point percentage in the nation at 49.23%, but was only able to manage 2-8 shooting from three on the night. The Overland Park, Kansas-born shooting guard finished with 10 points in 35 minutes.
Senior center Dorie Harrison scored 4 of the Bisons’ first 6 points, going 2-2 shooting in the first 3 minutes to help Lipscomb to a 6-3 lead early. Harrison fell awkwardly after scoring her second bucket, however, and exited the game due to an apparent ankle injury.
Harrison returned in the second quarter, but did not participate in the second half. The Kentucky transfer collected 4 rebounds to go with her 4 points.
Meanwhile, Peete took over in Harrison’s absence, scoring 10 points in the first frame. The Bisons never looked like a team that had missed two weeks for COVID protocols, finding an early rhythm on offense. Despite hot shooting from deep by JSU, Lipscomb built a 18-11 lead behind Peete’s 10 first-quarter points.
A three-pointer from well behind the line from graduate shooting guard Sydney Shelton hit the mark and beat the buzzer to put Lipscomb ahead 21-15.
Shelton, who finished with 11 points and previously played with both Mt. Vernon Community College and Butler, scored on the other side of the quarter break as well to put Lipscomb up 8. That would be their largest lead of the game, though, as Jacksonville State executed mercilessly on the offensive end.
JSU whittled away at the lead with strong shooting from outside, taking a 31-30 advantage into the halftime break.
“Really big credit to Jacksonville State,” assistant coach Chris Sumski said. “Our whole gameplan was to protect the paint and not give up offensive rebounds, and our kids really bought in and battled and fought hard to execute the gameplan. Jacksonville State made some tough shots that they haven’t really made consistently this year.”
Led by Imani Martin’s 20-point outing with 5 made 3-pointers, JSU scored 42 points on 3-balls alone. Lipscomb outscored the Gamecocks in the paint 38-18 but were outscored at the 3-point line by 21 points.
Lipscomb once again came out with fire to start the second half, reclaiming the lead behind a quick three from Pearson and a 2-pointer from Belmont transfer Maddie Cook.
The home team took the lead back for good, though, with 6 minutes to play in the third. A 7-0 JSU run down the stretch led the Gamecocks to a 29-20 advantage over Lipscomb in the third.
The fourth quarter featured resilience and hustle from the Bisons, but they never found the points they needed to close the gap. After letting Jacksonville State lead by 17 multiple times, Lipscomb fought back to cut the lead to 8 with just over a minute to play. Two free throws and a layup effectively iced the game at 80-68, and freshman forward Bella Vinson had the final say with a layup off a JSU turnover.
Despite scoring 20-plus points in three quarters for only the second time this season, the Bisons could not come up with enough offense to answer JSU. After shooting 60% from the floor in the first quarter, Lipscomb cooled off and ended up at 45% for the outing.
Partially to blame for the lower percentage were missed layups. On a night where Lipscomb penetrated the JSU defense well and got to the basket consistently, 38 points in the paint was actually a much lower number than it could have been. Lipscomb went 18-32 on layup attempts, missing 14 times under the basket.
“I thought we still got some really good looks throughout the whole game, honestly,” Sumski said. “We missed some tough ones that we normally make, and at one point we got looser with the ball than we usually are.”
Lipscomb committed just 11 turnovers, 1 more than JSU’s 10 but more than 5 less than their season average of 16.2.
The Bisons drop to 5-9 with the loss, including an 0-1 ASUN Conference record and a 1-7 mark away from Allen Arena. Jacksonville State moves to 12-3, winning their 6th straight and picking up their 10th win in 11 games.
Lipscomb faces off against Bellarmine 1:30 pm Saturday at Allen Arena in Nashville. That game will be broadcast live on The Bison, Lipscomb’s on-campus radio station.