Kingsville - On a day where its offense struggled to get going, the Texas A&M - Kingsville women's basketball team fell to No.12 Lubbock Christian, 59-43, and honored two of its graduating seniors as they played their final Saturday in the SPEC.
The Javelinas shot below 40% from the field and just 4-of-12 from downtown. Lubbock jumped out to an early lead as TAMUK got off to a slow start, not scoring its first points until nearly six minutes into the ballgame. From there, the Chaps answered every Kingsville run, holding any comeback attempt from the home team at bay.
"There's a reason they're the number 12 team in the country," Head Coach
Michael Madrid. "They're obviously playing for a No.1 seed in the conference tournament, but, most importantly, they're playing for a No.1 seed in the regional tournament. I thought we kind of got manhandled in a sense, defensively they're really good at what they do, they don't make a lot of mistakes, but offensively I thought we were really, really bad."
Forward
Veyda Lake and guard
Abby Bala were honored at halftime of the men's game, while the team's third graduating player, graduate student
Janessa Payne, chose to be honored with last year's class - the one she entered the program with. Lake spent all five years of her career with the Javelinas and will graduate with a degree in architectural engineering. Bala played her final years with TAMUK after transferring to Kingsville ahead of her junior season, she will graduate with a degree in kinesiology.
Lake and Payne led the team in scoring today with eight points a piece, the pair shot a collective seven of nine from the field.
Though Kingsville beat the Chaps on the glass, pulling down 30 rebounds compared to LCU's 28, the Javelinas weren't able to dig themselves out of the hole left by the road team shooting 71.43% from the field in the first frame.
TAMUK has one more game left in its regular season, a 5:30 p.m. bout with TAMIU at home on Thursday, though its win over Midwestern St. on Thursday punched its ticket to the Lone Star Conference tournament.
"We have a sign in our locker room that reads 'we play for March,' and that's always the goal, but there's a process to get there," Madrid said. "International is very, very athletic. They cause a lot of havoc on the defensive end of the floor. They pressure a lot more than LCU does, and we've struggled as of late taking care of the basketball and making good decisions, and it's not just one person, I feel like at times, it's collectively. We just have to refocus and have a big week of prep coming up and we'll put our best foot forward when we play Thursday."
