ABILENE – In a game they desperately needed to win if they want to reach the Lone Star Conference Post-Season Tournament, the ACU Wildcats let one slip away as they blew an 11-point second-half lead in a 82-74 loss to Angelo State in a women's LSC game at Moody Coliseum.
The loss drops the Wildcats to 7-9 overall and 2-8 in the LSC, while the Rambelles improve to 9-7 and 7-3. ACU – which is now ninth in the 11-team league – will be in San Angelo on Saturday to take on the Rambelles at the Junell Center at 5:30 p.m.
Angelo State entered the game near the bottom of the LSC in most offensive categories, including points per game (58.5 ppg) and 3-point field goal percentage (28.5 percent).
But the Rambelles looked like an offensive juggernaut Tuesday against the Wildcats as they scored a season-high 82 points, 24 more than their average. They also shot 33 percent from 3-point range, hitting of 8 of 24 from beyond the arc.
And Cassi Stegall – who entered the game with just 12 3-pointers on the season and a high-point game of 13 points – finished the night 5 of 6 from the arc and with a career-best 21 points.
The Wildcats, meanwhile, couldn't buy a bucket in the second half when it saw a 52-41 lead with 13:47 to play evaporate in a 10-minute stretch that saw them outscored 29-9 as the Rambelles turned that 11-point deficit into a 70-61 lead.
The Rambelles, in fact, outscored ACU 50-37 in the second half as they shot 48 percent from the field (13 of 27), while the Wildcats went ice-cold, hitting just 14 of 40 from the floor (35 percent).
Sophomore guard Mack Lankford had a game-high 29 points for the Wildcats on 10 of 19 shooting from the floor, and
Kelsey Smith had 14 points and nine rebounds, but that wasn't enough to keep the Wildcats from losing to Angelo State for the third straight time and fifth time in the last six meetings between the rivals.
