Third Quarter Slump Costs Rams Against Rebels

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FORT COLLINS, Colo. – The first 20 minutes were really good. The final 10 minutes weren't bad, either.

But the 10 which made up the third quarter became the undoing for Colorado State's women's basketball team, and one off quarter is all it takes against a conference leader. UNLV outscored the Rams 25-10 in the third, leading to an 80-69 victory as the hosts honored their two seniors – Karly Murphy and Upe Atosu – prior to tipoff.

Those ceremonies always bring out the emotions, which Colorado State seemed to funnel coming out to a strong start. It produced a 41-point first half, giving the hosts a five-point advantage at the break.

"I think so. I think everybody really just wanted to play hard for Upe and me," Murphy said. "I think there was a lot of emotion just because it was senior night and the top team was coming into Moby, and we really just wanted to give our fans the best game all year, so we had a lot of fight. It didn't come out our way at the end, but I'm proud of how this team fought."

Kendyll Kinzer did a lot of the heavy lifting in the first half, scoring 15 points on her way to a career-best 21-point outing. As UNLV threatened in the second, she delivered a trio of trifectas on her only three attempts, keeping the conference leaders at arm's length.

There were plenty of good vibes to go around, too. Murphy was productive in the paint on the way to her eighth double-double of the season, and McKenna Hofschild dished out five assists in the first half, pushing her past Becky Hammon into second place on the single-season assists list.

One quarter put a damper on it all for the Rams, who slipped to 18-9, 9-8 MW.

"That was their quarter, for sure," Kinzer said. "We said this fourth quarter needs to be ours, but unfortunately our fourth quarter just wasn't quite big enough, because they came out of halftime hot. Moving forward, we need to be able to do the same thing."

The third quarter was a different story. The Rams looked good in their offense up to the last step, which is knocking down shots. They hit just 23.1 percent in the frame, making only 3-of-13 attempts, just 1-of-6 from deep and wee a ho-hum 3-of-6 from the charity stripe.

A lack of offense at some point has been a strange bugaboo for the Rams – the third-best scoring team in the Mountain West – in a pair of home losses this week. Against San Diego State, it stretched out for three quarters.

"That was a difficult quarter for us," CSU coach Ryun William said. "The execution wasn't bad. You've got to make shots. UNLV is a very talented offensive team. They came out guns-a-blazing that third quarter, made a lot of shots. We couldn't get stops. I think what would have helped us offensively is if we could get some stops; we ran really well."

But there were signs of trouble before. The Rebels hit the offensive glass hard, and did so all game. Their first seven points of the night all came off second chances and they finished with 15 offensive boards, leading to 15 second-chance points.

Compounding the issues was the play of Kiara Jackson off the bench. While Colorado State kept Essence Booker and Desi-Rae Young from having bigger games than normal, Jackson scored a team-best 20 points, well above her 6.3 average.

In the fourth, Colorado State went toe-to-toe with the Rebels, but that doesn't cut into a lead, and McKenna Hofschild and Upe Atosu felt the frustration more than anything, combining to go 6-for-31 from the field as they scored 14 and 11, respectively.

"You've got to sustain some consistency offensively; we didn't do that in the second half. The start, really the last two home games, has been really good," Williams said. "We've had big first quarters. We just have to sustain it. We don't have a margin for error. If a couple of the wrong kids have rough nights, we're going to struggle."

Murphy eventually fouled out as the Rams were sending the Rebels to the line late, but did so with 13 points and 12 rebounds. Hofschild's nine assists give her 180 on the season, just seven away from the single-season record established by Ellen Nystrom (186) in 2015-16, and those seven assists would give her 301 in her career, which would tie her for 10^th all-time.

So the Rams will look at those positives and move them on to the final game of the regular season at Wyoming. With a win and a season sweep of the Cowgirls, the Rams still can't move up in the standings – Nevada, Wyoming and Air Force are all 10-6, and also play one less game than does CSU. The Rams sit sixth, but they can avoid any chaos of moving down, too.

At sixth, Colorado State plays the final game of the first day, March 6, in the Mountain West Tournament in Las Vegas, against the 11^th-seed, at 8 p.m. (MT). The 7-10 matchup is played prior, at 5:30 p.m.

"We need to look at the positives coming out of this game to stay up and stay ready for Wyoming, but also looking at the things we can improve and get better on for Wyoming and the conference tournament," Kinzer said. "I think just really looking at this game and analyzing it; we just played the best team in the conference and we had three really good quarters. I think looking at that is going to be the most important part for these next few weeks."

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