Otahks fall short to Tech charge

The well-oiled machine that is Tennessee Tech women's basketball has dominated the Ohio Valley Conference over the years with a disciplined, fundamentally sound style.

Southeast Missouri State University tried its best to break through the Golden Eaglettes' armor Tuesday night at the Show Me Center -- and the Otahkians administered plenty of dents on the way to an 80-77 loss.

"Tennessee Tech is so fundamental," Southeast coach Ed Arnzen said. "That's why they're the perennial conference champions."

Tech, which has won or shared nine of the past 12 OVC regular-season titles -- including the last four -- improved to 9-5 overall, 2-1 in the OVC. Southeast is 8-4 overall, 1-1 in the OVC.

The Eaglettes were led by two-time OVC Player of the Year Janet Holt. The multi-talented senior center had game highs of 28 points, six assists, and four steals.

"It's always a good game here. Remember last year," said Holt, recalling Tech's 80-79 victory at the Show Me Center that came on a shot at the buzzer. "SEMO always works hard and plays smart. We expected a game like this."

Southeast got 19 points from both Lori Chase and Veronica Benson. Chase, who hit all four of her 3-point attempts, did her damage in just 20 minutes as spent all but two first-half minutes on the bench after picking up two early fouls.

Pam Iversen added 13 points, eight rebounds and five assists while Tisa Thomas came off the bench to score 10 points and grab six rebounds.

Even without leading scorer Chase contributing much in the first half, the Otahkians entered the intermission with a 38-30 lead. The lead grew to 42-30.

Tech charged back and finally took the lead for good with 6:41 left as two Holt free throws made it 60-59.

Tech built a 74-65 lead on a Jennifer Wilhelm 3-pointer with 2:33 left, but then Southeast rallied.

An off-balance 3-pointer by Chase with 5.5 seconds remaining pulled the Otahkians to within 78-77. After Wilhelm hit two free throws with 4.8 seconds left to make it 80-77, Porter came up short on a 3-point try at the buzzer.

"The last five minutes, they converted better than we did. They hit some big shots, and then they hit all their free throws," Arnzen said. "We might have gotten tired in the second half. We didn't shoot it as well.

"But we played well. We outrebounded them (37-29) and we had 12 turnovers. I can live with that. Tech is just an excellent club."

After shooting 59 percent in the first half, the Otahkians fell off to 40 percent in the second half. Conversely, the Eaglettes improved to 57 percent in the final half after hitting 36 percent in the opening period.

mmishow@semissourian.com

(573) 335-6611, extension 132