Patience will be needed as Missouri State Lady Bears begin Cunningham era with loss to Mizzou

In the days leading up to Missouri State's season opener against Mizzou, sophomore guard Isabelle Delarue admitted that she felt like there was a bit of disconnection amongst the team.

"We could have been better prepared," Delarue said. "As a whole, as a team, we could have been more positive going into the game."

That disconnect was obvious during a 68-51 loss to Mizzou in Monday night's season opener at Great Southern Bank Arena. It snapped Missouri State's three-game winning streak against the Tigers and it was the program's first under head coach Beth Cunningham.

The "disconnect" could be explained through numerous factors playing with an extremely young roster that has nowhere near the experience that the previous three Lady Bears teams had when beating their rivals from up north.

Of the five players in the starting lineup, only one started a single game in the maroon and white. Five of the 10 Lady Bears who touched the floor played limited or zero minutes of Division I college basketball in their career.

On top of that, the Lady Bears were without their star fifth-year senior, Sydney Wilson, who continued to sit after missing the team's exhibition game last week. She was on crutches during the Lady Bears media day in late October with what has been described as a leg injury. Cunningham described her as "day-to-day."

But in the end, it wasn't the type of performance the Lady Bears are used to having in high-level matchups against the Tigers. The performance showed that it is going to take some time for everything to come together.

"You gotta have five people on the same page and everybody doing the same thing on both ends of the floor," Cunningham said. "A lot of it is just communicating and it's being at the right place at the right time. I think the more time we have to play together and learn each other, things are going to be better."

Missouri State finished the game shooting 31.3% from the floor and didn't hit its second 3 of the game until there was 3:53 left in the game. Dayton transfer Capria Brown finished the game with a team-high nine points. Even when winning the rebound battle and getting 18 offensive boards, they only finished with 11 second-chance points. Cunningham attributed the struggles to her team appearing to be rushed while needing to take a deep breath.

"I think we're a better offensive team than we showed," Cunningham said. "I think we can shoot the ball better and finish plays better than we did."

Defensively, the Lady Bears found themselves out of position frequently although the effort was never questioned. Mizzou had open looks at the basket while outscoring MSU 44-24 in the paint. Strafford legend Hayley Frank, a Mizzou senior, scored a game-high 17 points while junior guard Sara-Rose Smith scored 10 points and grabbed 10 boards.

Most of the struggles came during a stretch between the end of the first and the beginning of the second quarter when Mizzou went on a 20-2 run after MSU began with an early 9-4 lead. By halftime, the Lady Bears were down 31-17 and never got closer than within 13 for the remainder of the game.

"We allowed that run to go a little bit too long and we used so much energy to try and get back in it," Cunningham said. "I definitely think that run was basically the difference in the game."

Missouri State had some things to build off of with promising youth getting experience in front of maybe the biggest crowd they see all year. Eventually, the Lady Bears will add their best player to mix and they'll get more comfortable in a new offensive scheme.

It won't get easier, however, as the Lady Bears play a difficult non-conference schedule to begin the year with teams like Saint Louis and Oklahoma State on deck.

Patience will be needed around the young group. It's not the same situation that the Lady Bears had when Amaka Agugua-Hamilton walked in and had a Sweet 16 roster during her first year. This might take a little bit of time.

"I think there are some things to be able to build on," Cunningham said. "I'm excited to be a part of this and I hope people will continue to come out and support us and see our team grow throughout the season."

Wyatt D. Wheeler is a reporter and columnist with the Springfield News-Leader. You can contact him at 417-371-6987, by email at wwheeler@news-leader.com or Twitter at @WyattWheeler_NL. He's also the co-host of Sports Talk on Jock Radio weekdays from 4-6 p.m.

This article originally appeared on Springfield News-Leader: Mizzou women's basketball tops Missouri State on opening night