MOLINE, Ill. – Illinois State used a second-half push in which it out-scored Northern Iowa 49-42; however, the comeback came up just short as the Redbirds fell to the Panthers 79-75 in the MVC quarterfinal on Friday afternoon.
Maya Wong scored a team-high 19 points while dishing out a game-high five assists, while Abbie Aalsma scored 16 points including 4-of-6 shooting from long range, as DeAnna Wilson scored a dozen. Kate Bullman pulled down nine rebounds to go with her nine points, with Wilson nabbing eight rebounds for the Redbirds.
Illinois State made 30-of-69 shots from the field in the game (43.5 percent) and 9-of-24 (37.5 percent) from long range. Northern Iowa made 52.6 percent of its shots in the game (30-of-57), 43.8 percent from three-point range (7-of-16), and 12-of-17 free throws. The Panthers out-rebounded the Redbirds 36-to-32 despite ISU winning the second-half rebounding battle 21-to-13.
The Redbirds scored first in the game on an Aalsma jumper; however, Northern Iowa followed with six consecutive points and the Redbirds were playing catch-up for the remainder of the period and went into the quarter break trailing 20-11
In the second quarter the Redbird deficit reached as many as 18 before ISU ran off an 11-2 run with three-pointers from Molly Lenz, Aalsma, and Wong with a lay-up by Hannah Kelle mixed in, with the 'Birds closing the gap to nine at 35-26. A Panthers' jumper at the halftime buzzer sent Northern Iowa into the locker room with a 37-26 advantage.
The Illinois State offense erupted in the third quarter, using seven points from Bullman and six from DeAnna Wilson to out-score the Panthers 24-to-19. Trailing by 12 with 2:21 to play in the period, the Redbirds used a 10-1 run over a minute and 42-second span to close the gap to three with 18 seconds remaining in the period and went into the fourth quarter trailing by just six at 56-50.
ISU opened the fourth quarter strong, cutting the gap to four with 8:54 to play in the game on Aalsma's third three-pointer of the game; however, the fourth-seeded Panthers answered by running off the next seven points to push the margin back to double-digits. The 'Birds got the deficit down to as few as four on two separate occasions over the final 30 seconds of the game; but the Panthers iced the game down the stretch by making 8-of-10 free throws down the stretch in a 79-75 Panther victory.
UNI was led by Maya McDermott who scored a game-high 20 points, while Kayba Laube scored 17 and Cailyn Morgan 12.
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