Mercer women's winning streak snapped by East Tennessee State

Susie Gardner said Thursday she wanted to see how her Mercer women's basketball team would handle the success of its win over Chattanooga.

Through three quarters Saturday, the Bears appeared to be handling it just fine, but then they struggled in the fourth quarter in a 55-53 loss to East Tennessee State.

Mercer, which drops to 14-6 overall and 4-1 in Southern Conference play, had its eight-game winning streak stopped. ETSU improves to 12-9 and 4-2.

Tianna Tarter gave the Bucs the lead with a basket and a foul shot with 1.1 seconds remaining. Then Mercer's Kahlia Lawrence fumbled the inbounds pass and couldn't get off a shot as the buzzer sounded.

THREE WHO MATTERED

Tarter: The Buccaneers' sophomore scored 11 of her 22 points in the fourth quarter and added 10 rebounds.

Sydni Means: The Bears' sophomore point guard scored 15 points and hit all seven of her free throws.

Linnea Rosendal: The Bears freshman was the only other Mercer player to get into double figures, finishing with 13 points and hitting three 3-pointers.

TURNING POINT

Mercer stretched its lead 53-48 on two free throws by Means with 1:48 left, but the Bears didn't score again. Tarter scored six of the Bucs' final seven points.

OBSERVATIONS

Off night: Lawrence, the team's leading scorer, had just nine points, hitting 4-of-14 shots from the floor and missing both of her 3-point shots. Lawrence battled foul trouble throughout, finishing with four fouls, and she had six turnovers.

Board work: ETSU controlled the action on the boards with a 44-33 advantage, grabbing 15 on the offensive end. Shomari Kendrick led ETSU with 12 rebounds.

Controlling the paint: ETSU had a 24-16 advantage in the paint and an 11-4 advantage on second-chance points.

Strong in the middle: Mercer made only 2-of-13 shots in the first quarter and trailed 18-10, but it outscored ETSU 33-16 in the middle two quarters.

Nice recovery: ETSU didn't make a field goal for final 8:29 of third quarter and had only two in the quarter to trail 43-34 entering the final quarter. The Buccaneers, however, were 9-of-13 in the fourth quarter and outscored the Bears 21-10 in the quarter.

Offensive struggles: Mercer shot just 32.1 percent from the floor, hitting 18-of-56 shots, and finished with 15 turnovers and just nine assists.

THEY SAID IT

Gardner on the loss: "All we had to do was finish the game. We were uncharacteristic in some things. First of all, (Kendrick) killed us on the glass. She had eight offensive rebounds. I thought that was the stat of the game right there. I knew that Tarter was going to take over. We knew that she's their go-to, and you knew that she'd take over. I was having trouble figuring out which one of our players wanted to take over in terms of what plays to call. It just didn't feel like anyone wanted the ball in their hands, like 'Give me the ball.' "

Gardner on the close loss: "We won overtime, overtime, last-second shot, and I told our guys, 'At some point this season, the ball is not going to bounce our way, and we're going to lose a close one.' And that's why we have to be better on every possession, not just the last possession. That last possession wasn't what (lost the game). It could have been the free throws we missed. It could have been the layups we missed. It could have been the turnovers that we had. You can watch the film and find any number of opportunities that we let slip through."

WHAT'S NEXT?

Mercer travels to Wofford on Thursday.

This story was originally published January 23, 2016 at 4:51 PM with the headline "Mercer women's winning streak snapped by East Tennessee State ."