March 1, 2007

Final Stats

FAIRBORN, Ohio - Despite erupting for 41-points in the second half, Cleveland State was unable to make up for its shooting woes in the opening 20 minutes in a 63-55 loss at Wright State on Thursday night. The Vikings, who are 8-20 overall and 5-10 in the Horizon League, remain tied with Loyola and Youngstown State for sixth place heading into the final day of the regular season. Meanwhile, the Raiders lock up the No. 5 seed at 9-17, 7-8 HL.

Kailey Klein scored a game-high 18 points for the Vikings, including 14 in the second half. Chenara Wilson added nine points and five boards, while Nicole Thomas posted eight points, five rebounds and three steals.

Steph Comisar paced the Raiders with 12 points, while Tyanda Hammock and Whitney Lewis both tallied 11 points.

CSU hit just four of its 28 field goal attempts in the opening stanza (14.3 percent) as WSU took a 25-14 lead into the locker room.

"We were executing offensively and playing well on the defensive end -- we just weren't finishing," CSU head coach Kate Peterson said. "Had we shot just 25 percent, we would have probably been leading at the half."

The Raiders pushed the advantage to 14 (34-20) five minutes into the second half, thanks in part to six quick turnovers by the Vikings.

However, Klein scored nine points over the next seven minutes to fuel an 18-7 run that pulled CSU to within three points (41-38) at the 8:36 mark.

A Brittany Whiteside three-pointer momentarily stemmed the tide, but Dominique Butler answered with a lay-up and Jessica Roque followed with a three to cut the deficit to just one (44-43) with 7:06 remaining.

That would be as close as the Vikings would get, as Hammock converted a traditional three-point play and Kanisha Ward and Comisar added key triples down the stretch for the Raiders, who shot 62.5 percent (10-for-16) in the second half.

"We really fought back to put ourselves position to win in the second half -- it just came down to three possessions late where we made mistakes on defense and they made big plays," Peterson said. "We didn't capitalize on the turnovers we forced."

Wright State shot 47.4 percent for the game (18-38), while CSU converted just a third of its shots (19-57), despite a 51.7 percent effort (15-29) over the final 20 minutes. The Vikings held a 36-31 advantage on the boards, but the Raiders took advantage of a 29-12 bulge in points off of turnovers despite committing four more miscues (23-19).

Cleveland State wraps up the regular season on Saturday (March 3) with a 2:00 p.m. tip at Butler. The Vikings can still finish anywhere from sixth to eighth depending on how the final day plays out.