Senior Bianca Smith looks to get rid of the ball as she's pressured by Kansas State defenders during the Buffaloes' 72-70 loss to the Wildcats on Wednesday at the Coors Events Center. Smith finished with 14 points on Senior Night. (CU Independent/Patrick Ghidossi)
Senior Night is supposed to be a night for celebration.
It was anything but that for the Colorado Buffaloes women’s basketball team.
The Buffs lost to the Kansas State Wildcats 72-70 Wednesday at the Coors Events Center in Boulder.
“Unfortunately, we can’t win on senior night,” said Colorado head coach Kathy McConnell-Miller after the game. “We got off to a great start, but Kansas State made a couple of runs, and we couldn’t keep up.”
Junior forward Brittany Spears led Colorado (13-15, 3-12 Big 12) in scoring with 19 points, shooting 6-of-15 from the floor and a perfect 6-of-6 from the foul line. Sophomore guard Alyssa Fressle followed with 17 points, a season high for her, while senior guard Bianca Smith had 14 points.
The Buffs were out-rebounded 36-22.
Coming into their matchup with KSU, Smith said that the team didn’t expect to leave with a loss.
“We thought we could get a win coming into the game today,” Smith said. “We were confident.”
Coming off a five game losing streak, the Wildcats (13-16, 5-10 Big 12) were led by freshman guard Brittany Chambers and sophomore forward Jalana Childs, both finishing with 13 points. Chambers went 3-of-6 from the floor, while Childs went 5-of-8. Kansas State collectively missed only one free throw, shooting 19-of-20 from the line.
The Buffs opened the game with an 8-0 run, and led by as many as 10 at the 9:59 mark in the first half. Yet the Buffs couldn’t hold the lead as Kansas State staged a comeback to take the two point lead with 5:54 to go. After trading baskets, Fressle’s short jumper at the buzzer helped give Colorado the 32-31 lead at the break.
Spears went down hard at 15:21 in the first, and left the court for a few minutes. She returned, but looked to be shaken up throughout the rest of the game.
“I think that her injury did hurt us a little, because she was on such a great roll at the beginning of the game,” Smith said.
The Wildcats took control in the second half, shooting 64.7 percent in the final 20 minutes and stretched their lead to 13 with 11:51 left in regulation. The Buffs rallied, getting as close as two points with six seconds left, but it was not enough to counter Kansas State’s clutch free throw shooting.
K-State head coach Deb Patterson said she knew Wednesday night was going to be a tough game against CU.
“When you are competing in the Big 12, playing the 10th, 11th, or 12th team, it doesn’t matter who we are, or who our opponent is, you are going to get a great game every night,” Patterson said.
Next for Colorado is Iowa State on Saturday in Ames, Iowa before they head to Kansas City, Mo. for the Big 12 Championships beginning next Thursday.
Contact CU Independent Staff Writer Mark McNeillie at Mark.mcneillie@colorado.edu.
