Drake women's basketball suffers fourth straight loss with setback to Missouri State
Before the women's college basketball season even started, Drake’s Jan. 15 game with Missouri State was looked at as a giant Missouri Valley Conference matchup between a pair of the league’s top teams. Missouri State was picked to finish first in the MVC. Drake was selected to finish second.
Fast-forward a couple months and the Bears still have a shot at a conference crown. But Drake is rapidly fading from contention.
The Bulldogs suffered their first four-game losing streak in nearly a decade with a 69-53 defeat to Missouri State at the Knapp Center Saturday. They fell to 9-8 on the season and 1-5 in the MVC. It’s the first four-game losing streak for the Bulldogs since they suffered four straight setbacks in MVC play during the 2013-14 season. First-year Drake coach Allison Pohlman was an assistant coach that season for Jennie Baranczyk.
But Baranczyk is now gone to Oklahoma and the Bulldogs have struggled to find their footing early in the conference season. A short-handed roster led to back-to-back losses at Loyola and Valparaiso. But even a Drake roster back to full strength couldn’t stop the troubles earlier in the week when Drake lost 60-49 at home to Southern Illinois.
Saturday’s showdown with Missouri State, which was coming off a loss at Northern Iowa, was a shot for the Bulldogs to deliver a big win and potentially right the ship this season. But some second-half struggles for Drake erased any opportunity for that. Drake, one of the best offenses in the MVC, shot just 23.1% (3-for-13) from the field in the fourth quarter.
Drake briefly grabbed some momentum in the third quarter when Katie Dinnebier sank a 3-pointer, got fouled and hit a free throw for a four-point play. It jumpstarted a 12-1 run by the Bulldogs that ended with a layup by Anna Miller to tie the game 39-39. But Drake never could never get the lead in the second half. Missouri State answered with a 10-1 run and put things too far out of reach for Drake.
Iowa City native Paige Rocca scored 13 points for Missouri State, which improved to 12-3 on the season and 3-1 in MVC play. Megan Meyer scored a team-high 16 points for Drake.
Tommy Birch, the Register's sports enterprise and features reporter, has been working at the newspaper since 2008. He's the 2018 and 2020 Iowa Sportswriter of the Year. Reach him at tbirch@dmreg.com or 515-284-8468. Follow him on Twitter @TommyBirch.
This article originally appeared on Des Moines Register: Drake women's basketball suffers four-game losing streak in MVC play
