How Missouri State Lady Bears showed growth for its best win of the season vs. BYU

Beth Cunningham smiled as she let out a sigh of relief in the moments following the Lady Bears' 56-55 win over Brigham Young on Wednesday afternoon.

"I'll take it," the second-year coach exclaimed.

It had to be a similar exhale that she let out with 0.1 seconds left when BYU missed the first of two free throws while trying to tie the game. Once the first one didn't fall, MSU had the victory.

Missouri State didn't score a point over the final 5:42 of the game but the Lady Bears scored just enough to escape Great Southern Bank Arena with their best win of the young season.

"I was just really proud of the way the kids stepped up," Cunningham said. "It was a great defensive effort. I'm just really pleased with how our kids responded and the way we defended. It wasn't always perfect but our kids found a way to win and that was huge."

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Missouri State moved to 5-3 with its final non-conference game of the season coming up Thursday at 2:30 p.m. at home against Western Kentucky. The Lady Toppers beat Nevada 66-60 on Wednesday at Great Southern Bank Arena as a part of the "Lady Bears Classic."

The victory sealed the Lady Bears their first winning streak of the season after beating Wichita State 72-65 on Saturday afternoon. In the NET rankings, BYU ranked 84th entering Wednesday — two spots ahead of Mizzou which beat the Lady Bears by 18 on Dec. 6.

Although it wasn't the prettiest at times, the win gave the Lady Bears a needed sign of growth as a new roster comes together ahead of Missouri Valley Conference play beginning Dec. 30 against Northern Iowa.

"We've grown a ton," Cunningham said. "If you look across the board, you're seeing how much more assertive and confident Lacy (Stokes) is. Kyrah (Daniels) had some huge plays in key moments. I think our post players have finally really started to show their assertiveness on both ends of the floor, which we badly needed. We have eight new kids and it's figuring a lot of things out and then getting comfortable, not only with the system but playing with each other and understanding what it takes to win here."

It took every single point to pull off a win over a Power 5 opponent for the 11th year in a row.

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The Lady Bears quickly found themselves down in an eight-point hole less than four minutes into the game. That turned out to be BYU's largest lead and MSU battled back and took a two-point lead into the break after Angel Scott's 3-pointer with 14 seconds left in the second quarter.

Neither team led by more than five until the Lady Bears took an eight-point lead with 7:28 left in the game after a Scott layup. Their next basket, with 5:42 left on a jumper by Daniels, turned out to be their last as they built up a six-point lead.

The Lady Bears' defense clamped down and limited the Cougars to a pair of makes from the field for the remainder of the game. The Lady Bears had a chance to put the game on ice when Kennedy Taylor went to the line with seven seconds left but she missed both free throws.

Driving to the basket right before the final buzzer sounded, BYU's Amari Whiting drew contact and went to the free throw line with a tenth of a second left. She missed her first shot, while down two, to an eruption from the 1,619 that were in attendance.

"It was nerve-wracking and we worked so hard to get there," Scott said. "We wanted to win so bad but we got the stops that we needed to and we did what we needed to get that win."

Stokes led the Lady Bears with 13 points and three assists. Taylor and Daniels each added 10 points as the Lady Bears shot 39.6% from the field and scored 28 points off of BYU's 25 turnovers.

The defensive effort saw the Lady Bears steal the ball 10 times and block five shots with Daniels and Jade Masoagayo each contributing two.

For a young Lady Bears team that is fighting to find consistency, a win, no matter how it came, over a solid performance could go a long way heading into league play.

"We've had a difficult schedule and we know it's going to take a little bit of time," Cunningham said. "But I'm pleased with the progress we're making and I think our best days are certainly still ahead of us."

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 X at @WyattWheeler_NL. He's also the host of the weekly "Wyatt's World Podcast" on Spotify, Apple Podcasts and other podcasting platforms

This article originally appeared on Springfield News-Leader: Missouri State Lady Bears hold on to knock off BYU