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recap youngstown state
58
Milwaukee MKE 15-15
64
Winner Youngstown State YSU 22-8
Milwaukee MKE
15-15
58
Final
64
Youngstown State YSU
22-8
Winner
Score By Periods
Team 1 2 3 4 F
Milwaukee MKE 17 11 15 15 58
Youngstown State YSU 20 7 15 22 64

Game Recap: Women's Basketball |

Panthers Take Penguins To The Brink In Tournament Loss

Milwaukee breaks Horizon League blocks record – finish with 161 on the year

YOUNGSTOWN, Ohio – The Milwaukee women's basketball team's outstanding defense was once again on full display, limiting Youngstown State to its worst home performance of the season before coming up just short down the stretch in a nail-biting 64-58 loss in the Horizon League Tournament Quarterfinals Wednesday evening from the Beeghly Center.
 
MKE (15-15) held the Penguins (22-8) to 36 percent shooting (18-50) – their worst performance at home since way back in November – and nearly handed them just their second home loss of the season.
 
The Panthers forced YSU into a season-high 17 turnovers and kept Alison Smolinski – the Horizon-League record holder for made threes in this her final season – to just 2-4 shooting overall for the game.
 
Also notable, Milwaukee broke the Horizon League record for blocks in a season with another nine Wednesday, upping their season total to 161 – shattering the previous mark of 154 set by Loyola-Chicago back in 2010-11.
 
"I'm really proud of our team. When you talk about laying it on the line and playing a tournament game, that's exactly what you expect to see," Milwaukee head coach Kyle Rechlicz said. "We fought incredibly hard and I'm proud of how we played as a unit with our togetherness. We gave it everything we had, we just didn't quite come out on top."
 
Bre Cera came up huge time and again, finishing by tying her career high of 13 points on 6-9 shooting.
 
Lizzie Odegard added another nine points to go with a team-best six rebounds, three assists and a career-high three blocks.
 
Akaylah Hayes had a number of clutch shots and finished with eight points, three rebounds, three steals and one block. Classmate Ryaen Johnson added another four blocks – finishing her single-season school record at a whopping 76 – to go with five points and two rebounds in the very physical contest.
 
Sarah Cash – a second-team all-league honoree – led the way for Youngstown State with 15 points and 16 rebounds in the final home game of her career.
 
In a back-and-forth game that featured 12 ties and 12 lead changes, it all came down to the final stretch.
 
Milwaukee opened the fourth quarter with back-to-back jumpers from Horizon League All-Freshman player Megan Walstad to go ahead, 47-42 – the largest lead of the game by either team at that point.
 
After a timeout, YSU responded with a 12-2 run to take a five-point lead of its own at 54-49 with 4:23 to play to bring a raucous crowd to its feet.
 
But the young Panthers didn't panic, staying within striking distance before huge threes on back-to-back possessions from sophomore Sydney Staver and Odegard. That made it a 60-57 game with just 54 seconds left on the clock.
 
MKE was able to get the big defensive stop on the other end, but couldn't find a field goal the rest of the way, falling just short of the upset win on the road.
 
The Panthers were whistled for 25 fouls on the night compared to YSU's nine. Milwaukee dominated the points in the paint, 32-18, and once again outscored the opposing bench on the night, 30-11. Youngstown State claimed a 43-25 edge in rebounding in this one.
 
Also notable, the Panthers committed just seven turnovers on the night – a season best.
 
Wednesday's game was the final one for a pair of Panthers, as seniors Akaylah Hayes and Ryaen Johnson closed out their memorable careers with a total 77 wins over their four-year careers – the most for a graduating class in program history.
 
"We just talked about it in our locker room (after the game), they (Akaylah and Ryaen) were our heart all season," Rechlicz said. "They were the ones that stepped on the court every practice and demanded more from their teammates. And our team wanted to play for them because they're so unselfish, because they're so humble, and they really didn't care about their own statistics, they cared about the program and winning.
 
"When you have two seniors that are teaching the underclassmen what that looks like, that just says a lot. It's going to help us in the future – understanding what those two brought to us."
 
 
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