WHEELING, W.Va. – Baylee Goins was the only Yellow Jacket player that scored after the end of the third quarter, but Goins's 12 points in the final stanza was enough to send the Lady Jackets to the semifinal of the Mountain East Conference Tournament with a 61-58 upset-victory over the No. 2 seed West Virginia Wesleyan.
Goins shot 3-for-5, including 2-for-4 from beyond the arc, and 4-for-4 from the free throw in the fourth quarter. She finished with 18 points on 5-of-9 shooting from the field. Latisha Parris and Hallie Bailey each scored nine points, and Latifat Olatunji grabbed nine boards.
The Yellow Jackets took over half of the first quarter before they finally got on the scoreboard when Emyah Fortenberry hit a free throw at the 4:19 mark of the first quarter, kicking off a 7-0 run that gave State their first lead of the game. Latisha Parris capped the quarter with a fast break layup, putting WVSU ahead 13-9 after 10 minutes.
The two teams traded baskets back and forth through the first five minutes of the second quarter with the Bobcats gaining a single point at the media timeout. WVSU still led 23-20 at this point. Following the media timeout, WVSU put the clamps down on the Bobcat offense, stifling them for two-and-a-half minutes, leading State to a 9-0 run opened by Hallie Bailey's five points during the stretch. The Yellow Jackets took a 10-point lead into the halftime break, 35-25.
In the third quarter, the Yellow Jackets once again took a while to get going, allowing Wesleyan to climb to within four points, 35-31 before Bailey drove the paint and bucketed a layup at the 6:31 mark. A trey by Goins just before the under-five media timeout re-extended the WVSU lead to 40-33. From there to the end of the quarter, both teams added nine points to their total. State led 49-42 with 10 minutes to play in the quarterfinal.
Goins hit a trey at the 9:25 mark, but then State's offense went cold for over five minutes, allowing Wesleyan to creep back in, shrinking the WVSU lead to 52-50 at the final media timeout. Goins finally broke State's drought when she canned the long range jumper as the shot clock expired with just under three minutes to play. Goins drained another jumper with just over 40 seconds to play to put State up by five points. Wesleyan hit two foul shots to cut the lead back to three points, 57-54. Goins drilled both shots at the charity stripe, re-extending the lead to five. A quick bucket by Wesleyan was answered with two foul shots by Goins, 61-56 with 6.8 showing on the clock. One more basket by Wesleyan set the final score, sealing the upset.
WVSU will play the winner of the Glenville State/Wheeling quarterfinal on Saturday, March 8th at 2:30 p.m in the MEC semifinal.
