Big fourth quarter seals win for Beavers against Cougars

BSU uses 16-3 run in fourth frame to pull away

The Bemidji State University Women’s Basketball team held an eight-point lead entering the fourth quarter and then pulled away with a 16-3 final 10 minutes to defeat Minnesota Morris 71-50 on Saturday afternoon inside the BSU Gym.

Bemidji State (2-1) broke open the 7-7 tie getting two layups by Rachel Koenig and a layup by Sam Pogatchnik for the 13-7 lead.

Still holding a seven-point lead later in the opening quarter, Amme Sheforgen hit a layup, Sydney White a jumper and then a layup by Pogatchnik stretched the lead to 13. The Cougars (1-4) finished the final 20 seconds with a three-point-play leaving BSU with the 24-14 lead.

Minnesota Morris controlled play through the early parts of the second quarter outscoring the Beavers 10-3 to cut the lead to 27-24. Bemidji State responded with the next five points following a triple by Tiertyn Plasch to open the 32-24 lead at the 5:30 mark.

After Minnesota Morris surged back to tie the game at 32, BSU outscored the Cougars 9-4 the rest of the half to take the 41-36 lead at the break.

Minnesota Morris opened the second half with the first four points to get to within one, but that would be as close as they would get the rest of the way. Alayna Suprenand helped ignite a 7-0 run with a transition layup off a steal by Plasch. Alyssa Hill then hit back-to-back layups, turning the second one into a three-point-play for the 48-40 lead.

Ashlynne Guenther and Koenig tallied four straight points over the final minutes of the third to push the lead back into double digits before the Cougars tallied the final basket to leave BSU with the 55-47 lead entering the final quarter.

Bemidji State then put the game out of reach both on offense and defense. The Beavers scored the first 16 points of the fourth quarter and held the Cougars without a point for over eight minutes to claim the 71-50 victory.

Hill led the Beavers with 11 points on 5-10 shooting. Koenig added 11 points and six rebounds. Sheforgen gave the Beavers three in double figures in scoring with 10 points and seven rebounds, along with four steals.

Pogatchnik added eight points, seven rebounds and four assists. Suprenand had a team-high seven assists.

Bemidji State went 27-65 (41.5) from the field, 7-27 (25.9) from three and 10-15 (66.7) at the foul line. Minnesota Morris went 18-54 (33.3) from the field, 1-13 (7.7) from three and 13-20 (65) at the foul line. BSU held big advantages on points off turnovers (26-12), bench points (36-17) and points in the paint (40-28).

Bemidji State will now be off until Friday, December 1 when they will host Minot State to open Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference play starting at 7:30 p.m.