Box Score LIVINGSTON, Ala. – A season of frustrations ended on a high note for the University of West Alabama Saturday at Pruitt Hall as the Tigers downed Mississippi College 67-57 in Gulf South Conference women's basketball action.
With the win, the Tigers conclude the 2016-17 season 8-21 overall and improve to 5-17 among GSC competition. The Lady Choctaws end their season with a 12-14 mark on the year and are eliminated from post-season contention, falling to 9-13 in the league for a ninth place finish.
"It was the prettiest game we played all year, by the way," UWA head coach
Rusty Cram said.
His Tigers never trailed by more than five in a game that was tied nine times and had 11 lead changes. The definitive stretch in the contest came in the fourth quarter where the Tigers opened the period on a 10-0 run.
Ariel Wilson drained a three from the top of the key to tie it at 46 with 8:19 to play, igniting a furious stretch for UWA.
A
Sydney King layup at the 6:11 mark gave UWA the lead for good before a
Chloe Culpepper jumper with 5:46 to play moved it to 50-46. Culpepper added an old-fashioned three-point play with five minutes remaining to stretch the lead to seven.
Following a Mississippi College timeout, Choctaw leading scorer Kelley Allen hit a baseline jumper to get her team off the deck in the period. Allen would make another jumper with 4:08 to play to cut it to 53-50, but the Choctaws could get no closer.
Wilson and King stretched the advantage with a pair of field goals before
Peyton Parker made a jumper with 1:46 to go to set the lead at nine. Her two free throws at the 49 second mark gave the Tigers their largest lead of the day, a 12-point advantage.
"Our point guard went out and we had no continuity," Cram said of the Tigers' effectiveness with Parker on the bench for 23 of the game's first 30 minutes due to foul trouble.
"We decided to go ahead and play her with four fouls, and we finally got some chemistry."
With Parker on the floor in the fourth quarter, West Alabama outscored Mississippi College 24-10.
Wilson, one of two West Alabama seniors, had a game-high 21 points and 12 rebounds to go along with four assists in her final game as a Tiger. Fellow senior
Catherine Taylor was able to start the game and play one minute despite injury.
"That's something we started working on last night," Cram said of Taylor's participation in the game. "It started with us just trying to get her in for one defensive possession in a 2-3. Then, she started working on us and said she really wanted to get a shot off."
"We had a play drawn up where we knew they would double Ariel and get her an open shot. She darn near hit it too."
While the Tiger seniors had a memorable afternoon, underclassmen King and Culpepper had strong showings of their own. King finished with 13 points, while Culpepper posted nine points and 13 rebounds.
