Waxahachie, Texas – The RV Flying Queens fell short in the regular season finale at Southwestern Assemblies of God University (17-11, 14-9 SAC) on Saturday afternoon to finish 3
rd in the Sooner Athletic Conference standings – making them the 3 seed in the conference tournament and playing host for the opening round in a rematch of today's game.
RV Wayland Baptist (21-8, 16-7 SAC) fell behind 5-0 early, but
Linda Brice was able to knock down a 3-pointer to get the Queens on the board three minutes into the game. With just over four minutes remaining in the opening period and the Queens trailing 7-3,
Megan Nestor was able to rebound her own miss and go back up to finish the layup and make it 7-5. The Queens took an 8-7 lead with just under four minutes left after
Emily Sigala converted two free throws. However, the Lions would go on a 9-0 run to end the quarter and take a 16-8 lead into the second. The Queens had a tough time getting the ball to fall in the opening quarter after knocking down only 11.1% of their shot attempts.
The Queens fell down 10 points just over two minutes into the second, but Sigala drained a 3-pointer off the pass from
Ellie Bruffey to make it a 19-12 game. Nestor was able to convert on the inside for the bucket to make it 21-14 in favor of SAGU with just over six minutes until halftime. The Lions went on a 10-2 run over the next five minutes to extend their lead to 31-16. Brice was able to attack the basket for the layup in the final seconds of the first half to make it a 31-18 halftime score.
The Flying Queens opened the second half with an 8-2 run fueled by Nestor scoring all 8 of the Queens points during the run. She started it by cleaning up the offensive boards for a putback and finished it by once again by cleaning the offensive glass for a putback layup to make it 33-26, SAGU. The Lions followed the Queen's run with a huge 17-0 run that pushed their lead to 24 points with two minutes left in the third quarter. Brice was able to attack the basket off the feed from Sigala for another layup with just over a minute left in the period to make 50-30. After the Lions hit a 3-pointer at the buzzer, the Queens trailed 54-30 going to the final quarter.
Brice opened the fourth quarter for the Queens with another jumper off the Sigala assist to make it 54-32. Just over four minutes into the final quarter, Nestor continued to dominate the offensive boards by grabbing another one to score a putback layup through contact for an and-one. With just under two minutes remaining, Nestor scored her final two points off the dish from
Bobbie Fouquet. The Queens fell short to the Lions of SAGU by a score of 71-50.
Megan Nestor finished with her 6
th 20-20 game as she scored 22 points and grabbed 22 rebounds including 12 offensive rebounds.
Linda Brice added 11 points and 3 rebounds.
Emily Sigala contributed 8 points, 2 rebounds, and 2 assists.
Head Coach
Jason Cooper said about his team's performance, "We have a lot of growing pains this season. Today was another great lesson for our girls. We need to do a better job of adjusting to the way the game is being called as well as being ready to do our individual jobs on the court."
The Flying Queens will host these same SAGU Lions, who finished as the 6 seed, on Thursday night to see who will advance to Fort Worth to compete in the Sooner Athletic Conference Semi-Finals at Texas Wesleyan University. The two teams split their two matchups with each other this season with each home team taking the matchup. Tip is scheduled for 6:00 PM at the Hutcherson Center.
