Texas State Tumbles Against St. Mary’s

By Reily Chestnut
Sports Director

Another tough afternoon befell the Bobcats as they kicked off the Tulane Classic in New Orleans, Louisiana. After faltering defensively Monday at Mizzou, the team fell 89-62 against St. Mary’s after the Gaels shot 14-of-28 from outside.

The Gaels were already a tough out that Head Coach Zenarae Antoine knew her Bobcats had to play balanced in order to keep St. Mary’s from sweeping the floor. Unfortunately, Gaels star Sam Simons and her teammates had other ideas to “troubleshoot” the Bobcats. Early on, the Gaels attacked Bobcat guards like Toshua Leavitt to try and gas the Bobcats. It helped set the tone for St. Mary’s to end up running the scoreboard for 37 minutes total. Really the only thing that kept the Bobcats from starting off even further down the rabbit hole were the Gaels’ early turnover problems.

But Texas State still couldn’t find many offensive sparks outside of their usual stars. Leavitt led the Bobcats with 18 points off 7-of-12 shooting while twin starters Bailey and Brooke Holle chipped in 14 and 10 points, respectively. Looking back at this game you will find that the takeaways are simple:

1. Young players learning to handle the mental aspect of going down early will be crucial.
2. Cutting down transitional looks for your opponents to control the pace of play after St. Mary’s ended up missing only seven shots in the entire second half.
3. Foul trouble hindered the productivity of starting bigs Zandra Emmanuel and Ja’Kayla Bowie after both fouled early and finished with four fouls each.

Overall, St. Mary’s offensive fluidity was too much for the ‘Cats on this day in the Boot State. The only thing for Texas State to do will be to overcome either Old Dominion or Tulane tomorrow at high noon after dropping to 4-6 this season. Time is ticking for the ‘Cats to figure themselves out with only 3 more games until SBC play begins.

Featured photo by Texas State Athletics.