Southeast women's basketball team goes winless in New Mexico tournament

Southeast Missouri State women's basketball coach Ty Margenthaler is using the New Mexico tournament as a learning experience for his team.

The Redhawks finished 0-2 in the tournament and lost their fifth consecutive game.

"We're going to leave this tournament learning something about our basketball team and unfortunately we didn't win a game, but we're going to be alright when it's all said and done," Margenthaler said.

Southeast lost 73-55 to the host Lobos (3-4) in the consolation game Saturday at The Pit in Albuquerque, New Mexico.

The Lobos scored the first nine points of the game before Olivia Hackmann scored a layup with 16 minutes, 31 seconds to play in the first half.

The Redhawks scored only 17 points and shot 25.9 percent in the first half and went into the locker room trailing by 20 points.

"I told them that they need to start listening to the game plan and stick with the game plan and just play more as a team and not individual," Margenthaler said about his halftime talk. "I was proud that they did that and they showed that good things happen when you work hard and play together. I think they accomplished that and I think that's what we're going to take out of tonight's game."

Jordan Hunter made a 3-pointer just 15 seconds into the second half to cut the deficit to 17 points.

The Lobos and Redhawks traded points until Southeast went on a 7-0 run that was capped with a 3-pointer by Hackmann. During that span of less than a minute New Mexico committed two turnovers and the Redhawks pulled within nine points at 54-45 with 8:13 left in the game.

New Mexico went on a 12-4 run to make it 66-49 with 2:44 left, and the Redhawks couldn't make a comeback.

Kara Wright led Southeast with 15 points on 5-of-7 shooting.

Olivia Hackmann and Jordan Hunter had 10 points apiece. Brianna Mitchell had six, Hillary Lively had five and Patricia Mack had four points and 13 rebounds.

The Lobos had three players score in double digits. Khadijah Shumpert led all scorers with 20 points , Antiesha Brown finished with 15 and Sara Halasz had 14.

The Redhawks lost their first game of the tournament to eventual tournament champion Arkansas (8-0) on Friday.

The Razorbacks rolled to an 88-37 victory over Southeast at The Pit.

Southeast scored only four points in the first 12 minutes of the game and trailed 23-4 with 7:54 to play in the first half.

Arkansas defeated Binghamton (1-5) 72-23 in the tournament championship game on Saturday.