The Purple Aces played with only seven active players against the fifth-place Valley team
EVANSVILLE, Ind. – In their final home game in the month of February the University of Evansville women’s basketball team didn’t hang on in a 73-53 loss.
With only seven active players on Saturday afternoon, the Purple Aces fell behind in the second half against the Illinois State Redbirds. UE did keep things even when it came to steals, having six to Illinois State’s five while the Redbirds had one more turnover with 14. Freshman guard Logan Luebbers Palmer (Union, Ky. / Randall K. Cooper HS) led Evansville with a new career scoring high of 17 points.
It was a defensive battle early in Meeks Family Fieldhouse as the Aces forced a shot clock violation on Illinois State’s first possession. The scoring went back and forth until UE had the first run of the game with five points. The Redbirds responded with a 12-point run of their own to pull away by nine. Evansville was able to get back into the game with a long jumper from sophomore forward Claudia Clement (Barcelona, Spain) and back-to-back trips to the free throw line. After 10 minutes the Aces only trailed by three points.
The second quarter started with matching layups. Neither team had a run longer than five points throughout the second. UE’s defense kept Illinois State’s offense stifled in the back half of the second quarter. The Redbirds didn’t make a field goal in the final two and a half minutes while Evansville senior guard Júlia Palomo (La Seu d’Urgell, Spain) ended the first half with two. The Aces entered the locker room down only by eight with a 33-25 score.
Palmer scored the first point of the second half at the free throw line and followed it up with a three pointer to make it a six-point game. Illinois State responded with a four-point run that was broken by a second three for Palomo. The Redbirds scored a three of their own before breaking out on an eight-point run. Palmer again helped the UE offense with a jumper to end the scoreless drought. But Illinois State put together a seven-point run to end the third as Evansville trailed 57-36.
The Aces began the fourth quickly with two threes and a field goal in just over two minutes to get the deficit down to 14. That would be the closest UE would get to the Redbirds as they consistently pulled away on short runs. The Illinois State lead grew to 22 by the final two minutes on a six-point run. Freshman guard Camryn Runner (Cicero, Ind. / Hamilton Heights HS) made two free throws for the last points of the game with 1:43 on the clock as Evansville fell to the Redbirds 73-53.
The Aces had three players in double figures between Palmer (17), Palomo (13), and Runner (11). Sophomore forward Maggie Hartwig (Sauk City, Wis. / Sauk Prairie HS) had another double-digit rebounding game with 11 boards while Palomo led the team in steals with four.
Evansville returns to the road for the next two weeks starting with a trip to Valparaiso. The Aces will square off with the Beacons on Friday, February 21. Tip-off from the ARC on Friday is set for 6 p.m.
