NORMAN,
Okla. - Jacy
Bradley had
11 points, four rebounds and a game-high four steals, and Lorreal Jones grabbed a game-high 10 rebounds in Saint Louis' 68-33
loss to No. 11 Oklahoma Sunday afternoon at the Lloyd Noble Center.
Mallory Eggert
scored seven points and Courtney Webb
added six for the Billikens (0-3). Oklahoma (2-1) got 15 points from Nicole
Griffin and 13 from Aaryn Ellenberg, while Whitney Hand had 11 points, six
rebounds, four assists and three steals.
Six
of Jones' rebounds came on the offensive glass.
"First
of all, you have to credit Oklahoma," head coach Lisa Stone said. "They're a very good team, and playing them is a
daunting task. But I told our players, this is less about playing Oklahoma and
more about us trying to get better.
"I
give our players credit. We improved in certain areas today, and I thought we
handled adversity better than we did in our first couple of games. And, we
competed in the second half."
SLU
trailed 40-10 at halftime but limited Oklahoma to 28 points and 38-percent
field goal shooting after the break. The Billikens held the Sooners scoreless
on OU's first eight second-half possessions.
Later
in the second stanza, Saint Louis scored on five straight and six of seven
possessions. Eggert tallied five of her seven points during that stretch.
"At halftime,
I told the team that the score was 0-0 and to forget about the first half, it's
over," Stone said. "It's 0-0, let's do what we do, let's come out with some
fire and play hard. Show some pride and show some character, and I thought we
did that. I'm really proud of our team in that regard.
"We
found ways to execute in the second half and were outscored just 28-23. If it's
28-23 walking into the locker room at halftime, I'm pretty excited.
"Griffin
inside is a nice player, but I thought Mallory Eggert did a nice job guarding
her in the second half," Stone said. "As a team, we did a good job in the
second half holding them under 40 percent shooting. Offensively, we didn't have
a scoring flurry, but we scored better.
"Those
are the mini victories you have to take from a game like this. We have to learn
from it, take the positives and move on, and I'm confident we will."
The
Billikens play at Nebraska-Omaha Wednesday, Nov. 21. Tip time is 2 p.m.