Story by DJ Pigg, Staff writer
Murray State women’s basketball team fell to the hands of No. 4 University of Louisville on Saturday 115-51.
The Racers struggled against the Cardinals from the tip, as they were outscored 29-8 in the first quarter. Murray State shot just 29.5 percent from the field, 26.5 percent from behind the arc, and 46.2 percent from the free throw line. While struggling to score, the Racers also had a hard time keeping Louisville from scoring. The Cardinals shot 55.3 percent from the field, 33.3 percent from three and 82.4 percent from the charity stripe.
The Racers were led by junior guard Abria Gulledge who contributed 18 points on 6-of-11 shooting as four of her six field goals were from beyond the three-point line. Following Gulledge was senior forward Ke’Shunan James, who went into the game leading the nation in scoring with 29.3 points per game. James had 13 points on 5-of-16 shooting where ten of her 16 shot attempts were from behind the three-point line.
Louisville had five players in double figure scoring. They were led by sophomore forward Kylee Shook who had 21 points on 8-of-10 shooting. Following Shook was sophomore forward Bianca Dunham with 19 points, sophomore guard Sydney Zambrotta with 16, freshman guard Dana Evans with 14 and junior forward Sam Fuehring with 12.
Despite the loss, Head Coach Rechelle Turner was pleased with her team’s persistence in the third quarter of the game.
“I was really proud of the effort that we showed in the third quarter,” Turner said. “We showed some life, and in games like this, you want to put two or three stops together in a row. If you can do that, then you hope that you can gain some confidence that you can do that as conference play begins. We did find a good number of positives in today’s game.”
The Racers will continue the routine of two days of practice before their next game which will take place at 6 p.m. on Monday, Nov. 27 at home in the CFSB Center against Bethel University. Bethel (5-3) will be coming off their game on Nov. 25 against MidAmerica Nazarene University.
