This season’s Wyoming Cowgirl basketball squad wasted no time bringing a tough opponent to the Arena-Auditorium, which is exactly what they got in an upstart Colorado Buffaloes team that was in the Sweet Sixteen of the women’s NCAA tournament just last season.
While the Cowgirls battled hard in their season opener that proved to be a cage match between both teams, the Buffaloes second half effort proved to be too much for the Cowgirls despite having a six point lead at halftime.
“I think we put ourselves in position to go and win that game and we definitely came out ready,” senior point guard Emily Mellema said after the game. “I think that we can’t be mad about this loss, necessarily. Hopefully we can learn from it.”
The Cowgirls wasted little time beating the Buffaloes to the first punch early on in this one, as Ola Ustowska, who averaged just 2.6 points a season ago, got the Cowgirls off to a hot start with five straight points.
After taking an early 9-2 lead, the Buffaloes battled back to cut the Cowgirls lead to 11-8. Mellema would again extend the Cowgirl lead late in the first quarter to make it 15-10 heading into the second frame, but missed an opportunity to extend that lead even further after missing a pair of free throws.
Unfortunately for the Cowgirls, those missed free throws would come back to haunt them, despite the fact that the Buffaloes also struggled from the charity stripe. The Cowgirls finished the game making just 9/15 of their freebies, while the Buffaloes went 13/24 from the free throw line. Those six missed free throws sting even more for the Cowgirls considered the six point margin they lost by.
“You lose by six, and that’s a different ball game if you can make a couple free throws,” Mellema said.
The Cowgirls’ defense, however, would play heavily in their favor, particularly in the second frame of the contest. The vigorous Cowgirl defense would hold the Buffaloes to an unimpressive 23.5% from the field in the second quarter and hadn’t allowed a single three point shot in the entire first half. After only allowing eight points in the second frame, the Cowgirls would take a 24-18 lead heading into the break.
The Buffaloes came into the third frame with a heavy sense of aggression, as the Buffaloes pressed full court and began to attack the Cowgirls’ interior defense, leading to the Cowgirls’ star senior center, Allyson Fertig, to quickly pick up three detrimental fouls, followed by Mellema finding a seat on the bench after picking up three fouls as well.
“Me and Allison have to be aware that we can’t get ourselves into foul trouble,” Mellema said. “Obviously we have girls who can come in for us, but that’s not what we want to do, we’d rather be on the court.”
The Buffaloes aggressive take to the third quarter quickly found them back in the game and more, as the Buffaloes exploded offensively in the third frame, out-scorcing the Cowgirls by 10 in the quarter as they took a 38-34 lead heading into the final quarter of play.
“I think the third quarter is when their pressure really started to ramp up, we had a hard time making some entry passes,” head coach Heather Ezell said.
The Buffaloes continued their proficient play in the fourth quarter as well, as the Cowgirls’ second half woes continued to plague them until a Tess Barnes three around the 6:30 mark would suddenly shift the momentum as they’d claw back from an eight point lead at the time. However, a costly turnover with just a minute left with a two point deficit for the Cowgirls proved to be the their undoing as the Buffaloes would extend their lead to four on the ensuing possession, as the Cowgirls would not be able to answer back, ultimately losing the contest by a score of 56-50.
The most glaring issue for the Cowgirls within the contest was their struggle to take care of the ball, as the Cowgirls recorded 19 turnovers in the game.
“I always say, I’ll take some dead ball turnovers, because at least we can get back and set up our defense. It’s those live turnovers up top that we can’t sprint back and get a stop on,” Ezell said of the turnovers.
“We can clean up the turnovers,” she added.
The Cowgirls also struggled to shoot the ball, making just three of 15 attempts from beyond the arc. The Cowgirls also saw little production from their bench, only getting two points from their reserves. The Cowgirls, however, were missing their top reserve, McKinley Bradshaw, due to an undisclosed injury .
“I need someone to step up and be ready to play and knock down some shots and give us some energy,” Ezell said.
The Cowgirls will attempt to avenge their loss to the Buffaloes with a matchup against another Big 12 team on November 9, when the Cowgirls head to Provo to take on BYU.
