MANHATTAN, Kansas â K-State captured an early fourth quarter lead on Thursday night, but Colorado used a decisive run to down the Wildcats, 56-47, in Bramlage Coliseum.
K-State (11-11, 4-5 Big 12) was paced by a pair of freshmen on Thursday, as Jordan Speiser carded 12 points and five rebounds, while Gina Garcia tallied eight points, four rebounds and four assists.
Colorado (14-7, 5-4) saw four players reach double figures and were led by Zyanna Walker with a double-double of 13 points and 10 rebounds, while adding four steals and two assists.
HOW IT HAPPENED
- Trailing by four, 37-33, entering the fourth quarter, K-State used an 8-0 rally to pull in front, 41-38. Nastja Claessens buried a corner three-pointer and was followed by a pair of free throws from Speiser. Brandie Harrod then finished an old-fashioned three-point play with 7:33 remaining in the fourth. Harrod would tally eight points and five rebounds.
- The Buffaloes answered with an 11-1 run over a three-minute stretch midway through the fourth to pull in front by seven, 49-42, with 4:17 left. Walker broke a 42-42 tie with a three-pointer to spark a 7-0 run.
- K-State closed to within three, 49-46, on a Garcia runner with 2:51 remaining but were not able to narrow the margin.
- The Wildcats shot 32.7 percent (16-of-49) from the field, including 13.3 percent (2-of-15) from 3-point range.
QUICK FACTS
- Colorado leads the series, 36-35. K-State leads the series in Manhattan, 18-15. Head coach Jeff Mittie is 0-6 in his career against Colorado.
- K-State head coach Jeff Mittie owns a career record of 683-389 (.637), including a mark of 229-154 (.598).
- In its 30th season of play in the Big 12, K-State owns a record of 249-252 (.497) in Big 12 action.
- K-State is 418-163 (.719) in its 38th-season inside Bramlage Coliseum, including a 148-55 (.729) record under Mittie.
- The Wildcats are 268-199 (.574) in games played in the month of January. Under head coach Jeff Mittie, K-State is 49-47 (.510) in games during the 1st month.
TEAM NOTES
- K-State's starting five consisted of guards Gina Garcia, Brandie Harrod, and Taryn Sides, forward Nastja Claessens and center Ramiya White. This was the first time this lineup has started together this season. This was the 21st career start for Sides. This was the 20th career start for Garcia. Harrod made her 19th career start. Claessens made her 18th career start. This was the 2nd start for White.
- Since the start of the quarter-system in womenâs college basketball in the 2015-16 season, K-State owns a record of 119-30 (.799) when holding an opponent to single digits in any quarter in a game, including a 5-1 record this season. The Wildcats held the Buffaloes to nine points in the second quarter on Thursday. This was the eighth quarter this season holding an opponent to single digits in a quarter.
PLAYER NOTES
- Speiser carded 12 points on Thursday. This was her 11th game this season with 10 or more points.
- Speiser pulled in five rebounds. This was her seventh career game with five or more rebounds.
- Ivona Scekic registered a career-high five rebounds on Thursday. Entering action, she had played in two games with a total of three rebounds.
- Taryn Sides dished out three assists on Thursday. She remains 22nd in program history with 271.
- Sides pocketed four steals. This was her seventh career game with four or more steals and her 23rd career game with two or more steals.
- Brandie Harrod hauled in five rebounds on Thursday. This was her 14th game this season with five or more rebounds. She collected an offensive rebound and is seventh in program history for offensive rebounds in a freshman season with 52.
- Aniya Foy got her hand on two steals. This was her third game this season with two or more steals.
FROM THE HEAD COACH
K-State Head Coach Jeff Mittie
On the fourth quarterâŠ
âI think obviously we're struggling with execution and what to run at that time and who to run it for. They did a good job on [Taryn Sides], did a good job on [Jordan Speiser]. They defended the three line really well. And so we were trying to find some different things, but obviously we just couldn't find enough offense there. I thought our defense played well enough to win the game, and offensively, we struggled all night long.â
On Ivona Scekicâs performanceâŠ
âI've liked the way she's practiced the last two, three days. I think we feel like she's got her feet under her. I feel like with the style of play, she's adjusted well. So I wanted to give her an opportunity, and I thought she gave us some good minutes.â
On the defensive side of the ballâŠ
âWe battled all night long. My argument early in the game was too many second chances. Certainly, [AnaĂ«lle Dutat] early in this game, really got to the offensive glass, kept her off the offensive glass in the second half. They got fewer opportunities in the second half. Now, they got some big ones. They got some big ones in that last six minutes, last seven minutes maybe. But I thought our defense was good. I thought we made good decisions defensively for the most part. I liked our awareness of where their shooters were. They're not a prolific three-point shooting team, but we did a good job on [Tabitha Betson]. We did a pretty good job on [Desiree Wooten]. I thought we had a good awareness there.â
On if the quantity of free throws made up for the lack of threes madeâŠ
âWe got to the free throw line better, obviously in the second half, but we only got 15 threes off. Probably a dozen of them were guarded pretty well. We didnât get many open threes. Generally when weâre playing really good offense weâre getting some open three looks, and we didnât get many tonight.â
On Nastja Claessens fouling out of the game halfway through the fourthâŠ
âWe prefer to have [Nastja Claessens] on the floor. She's one of our players that we can move around to different places on the floor, and she's able to seamlessly run those spots. That's really valuable, particularly in a game where points are hard to come by. We only have a few players that can do that and run whatever we're running. So it was big. Unfortunately, we were just in a situation where we felt like we needed to have her on the floor.â
Colorado Head Coach JR Payne
Opening StatementâŠ
âI'm really proud of our team tonight. I thought we showed a tremendous amount of resilience down the stretch of the game, with some really key stops, some really key rebounds, and free throws. I wish we'd made more of them. But we made some important free throws, some big shots, some great execution, lots of different people contributed, as we should in order to try to win a game on the road in the Big 12, everyone's going to have to do their job really well. And I thought we just executed and did what we needed to do against a really good K-State team.â
On Zyanna Walkerâs return to Kansas StateâŠ
âZyanna [Walker] has a tremendous amount of love for Kansas State and for this program and all of the great wins and success that she had while she was here. So I think she was very excited to come back, to see some teammates and coaches in this environment. But of course, she also wanted to win. And it's great for her to have the opportunity after a tremendous amount of work she's poured in, she was injured in the fall, and worked very hard to come back. And really great for her to be able to have success in front of her friends and family here and in Manhattan.â
On Coloradoâs big fourth quarterâŠ.
âI thought our execution was really good. I think we have a really unselfish group. You can tell kind of by the scoring. It's very balanced. Every night. We don't really have a 20-point scorer, but we got a bunch of 10-point scorers, and so we love to share the ball. And I thought we did that. We scored in a handful of different ways, executed, knocked down a couple shots, which always helps. And just played unselfish.â
FROM THE FLOOR
K-State Freshman Guard Jordan Speiser
On what went wrongâŠ
âWe just let the momentum really just fall out of our hands. I feel like we had the momentum and obviously just turnovers, not just on my teammates, even myself, and we let them outrebound us. I feel like those were the major three things and it cost us the game.â
On K-Stateâs struggles from three tonightâŠ
âObviously I went zero for six from the three-point line. I felt like we just couldn't hit a three to save our lives. And it happens, but I feel like that game was definitely in reach, and even if we weren' t shooting the three-ball well it was definitely winnable, and we just got to continue to keep our heads down and figure it out.â
On the Tess Heal situationâŠ
âObviously, it's frustrating. Like every day we're asking her, âDid you find something out?â And she hasn't heard anything. She's really taken on a leadership role off the court, just helping us in practice. I mean, she's on the practice team now.â
K-State Freshman Guard Gina Garcia
On playing Zyanna Walker and the team's strugglesâŠ
âShe really challenged me. She's a really great defender, and it was hard to play against her. I just think that we werenât great as a team and we were struggling a little bit.â
On Ivona ScekicâŠ
âYeah, she was really good. She was fighting so hard and she had really good minutes.â
UP NEXT
K-State begins February with a two-game trip through the state of Arizona, as the Wildcats visit Arizona State for the first time since 1988. Sundayâs game will tip at 3 p.m. (CT).